Morning Watch Monday: Internal Updates
Morning Watch Mondays
Welcome back to our blog series, written by Matt Sloan, Camp’s Chaplain and Shoulder Season Events Director. These “Morning Watch Mondays” will be posted twice a month, inviting a moment of reflection the same way our daily Morning Watch times do during the summer.
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This past week, My laptop couldn’t load the latest update. By “latest update,” I mean that I haven’t been able to download a software update in years because I don’t have enough storage space (this is a 2015 macbook I’m dealing with…). So over the last few days, I’ve taken on the task of clearing space for the update, dragging countless images and documents to the trash. It’s a work in progress.
As I look back over the years in pictures, there are simply some things I cannot bring myself to throw into the digital landfill. They include memories of my wife’s marathons, my daughter’s talent shows, 9 seconds spurts of my son’s many soccer games, and the first time my Boykin Spaniel fetched in the yard.
I can watch those over and over again! I’m finding megabytes of family adventures to Young Life camps, gigabytes of friends I haven’t seen in years, and memories both joyful and painful. How does one sort through them all, much less throw them away??!!
I don’t look back often, maybe not often enough. The new year has come, and with it has come new resolutions and hopes of how things in our lives will be different going forward. Yet, as we set out to “download this year’s update” within ourselves, I wonder if it wouldn’t do some good to dig through the images stored in our hearts and minds over the past year.
I dare you to take 2 minutes right now. Stop reading, and mentally browse over your last year. Go ahead…
It’s hard to simply stop, isn’t it? What delights you about this past year? What went as you planned, and what unexpected surprises came along? Do you think that God had anything to do with your last year?
You might be saying to yourself, “Well, probably Matt. God is in charge of everything.” Great point you’ve made there, but do you see any proof in your life that He was actively involved with you? If you’re thinking, “Nope. Well, maybe. I don’t know, Matt,” then thank you for your honesty. It can be strange to look for where a big old God might be engaging in our little old lives…but He is!
Even when we aren’t looking for Him, God is on the move in our lives and in the world. He made us to know Him deeply, and to be in touch with what He is up to in us and around us. It is true in the year behind us, as well as in the year ahead!
What “update” might God have in store for you in the year ahead?
Just like we trust that our phones and Xboxes need updates to work the latest games and apps, our hearts only work when we trust God to be downloaded into them to bring us new life.
Jesus says in John 10:10, “The thief comes only to steal, kill and destroy. I have come that they may have life, and life to the full”.
Question for the day: Can you think of a time during this past year where you think God might have been calling out for your attention?
Thought for the day: “For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord” Romans 8:38-39