Order Up

As I may or may not have mentioned on this blog before, one of my only constant prayers throughout the year 2011 was to be an example of Godly wisdom in all areas of my life. I have found that through this pursuit of wisdom, my first year of college was specifically set aside to gain discipline. And ooh man it's been a trying one!

Discipline is kind of one of those binary concepts in that it is most often seen in two ways:
   1) Having an authority figure disciple you
   2) Being the authority figure to discipline another

My experience this past year, however, involved both of these methods; I had to learn to be the person to discipline myself. And not just within my spiritual walk, but it was also resonate in my academics, finances, relationships, and physical health.

Over the past few years my parents have instilled in me that the Lord is a Lord of order.  In His worship, His doctrine, and His ways, He demands that we do all things for Him with orderly conduct. Furthermore, He calls us to do everything we do with excellence in mind (something I do not take lightly). And now, I have been brought to the place where these ideals are no longer simply spoken words--they have become words put in motion.

I believe that it takes a great deal of discipline to implement excellence into our daily lives. We may not always care to put our utmost energy into cleaning our room because "It'll just get dirty again," or we may choose to slack while composing that one essay because "it's only a draft," or we even become choose to become lazy rather than make the most out of the last five minutes of our workout. Such things may seem trivial, but living a life with the spirit of excellence means that we always put the greatest effort into properly representing who Christ is.

But wait! Does this mean that we must be perfect? Absolutely not! Perfectionism and the desire for excellence are two complete things! The first requires doing all things in your own power in order to seem without err, and the latter involves putting our best foot forward to make the most with what abilities we have been given.

I am not surprised that the "wisdom" book in the Bible--Proverbs my friends!--describes the purpose of the book as this:

The proverbs of Solomon, son of David, King of Israel; for attaining wisdom and discipline, for understanding words of insight; for acquiring a disciplined and prudent life, doing what is right and just and fair [...] The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and discipline.

~Proverbs 1:1-3, 7 (NIV 1984)