Thursday, August 4, 2016

Breaking New Ground

Today, the Lord reminded me of the transformation process He has taken me through since my first radical encounter with Him back in 2007. When I finally got serious in my pursuit of Him, He taught me to trust Him. For an entire year, He had me meditating on Proverbs 3:5-6...for an entire year!

Trust the Lord with all your heart.
Do not lean on your own understanding,
but in all your ways acknowledge Him,
and He will direct your paths. 

Throughout that time, I focused on and emphasized each and every word, one at a time, really seeking the wisdom and understanding that I knew He had for me. The bible says, "…faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God..."and boy did I hear it loud and clear.

The next phase God moved me to after that was teaching me about love, what it is, how to recognize it, and the need to become it just as He is love. From there, just last year He took me through a process of dying to myself, which brings me to the point of my message today as I noticed this quote today by Graham Cooke:

In order to grow, you must let things break. 

What a profound insight. As we are nearing the completion of week #2 in the Brotherhood Mutual Smallest Winner program, I am noticing that there are things in me that are starting to break. For instance, I used to be the kind of guy who would start projects, get bored, and move on to something else. Or if it seemed too hard, I would just drop it. Back in April when Brotherhood announced the Spring into Fitness program which required at least 3 days of cardio activity for at least 30 minutes each day, I noticed that it was easy for me to skip a week of reporting because I had failed to do the work. As we began the BMSW program, I didn't know for sure if I would be able to sustain a healthy lifestyle following "graduation", but with each new day the more my confidence is growing that I can do this. 

Frank put it well as we wrapped up our workout this morning when he said that we have the opportunity to celebrate many accomplishments each and every day. As we trust the process and continue to stretch ourselves beyond our old comfort zones, we can count a number of accomplishments: Getting up early, out the door, and to the gym on time. Doing more physical activity than most Americans do in an entire week, if ever. Intentionally welcoming and enduring soreness, sweat, discomfort, and inconvenience. 

All that we're doing is so worth it, because it is causing old habits and mindsets to break off of me. In fact since I arrived at work after our workout this morning, 
I have noticed myself walking and tensing my glutes and legs, keeping my toes up when marching up the stairs, and doing toe raises while sitting at my desk to stretch my shins. And as I was re-reading through this message, my arms were crossed over what used to be a bigger belly. 

This would have never been possible without our Lord and each of you helping me along the way. 

Thank you!
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3 comments:

  1. Thank you Gavin for writing that up. If you ever need someone to be at the gym with you let me know. I will do what I can to be there to help.

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  2. Gavin what I learned is to just take it one day at a time. I just focused on what I needed to do now and didn't worry about what would be coming later. That helped me to not drop out in the middle. I use to be like you and glad to hear that I am not the only one.

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