HIGH MAINTENANCE

Life is just high-maintenance.

Just as you fold the last piece of laundry and tuck it into a drawer, somewhere else in the house another piece of dirty laundry is being dropped into a hamper.

Moments after scrubbing the toilet to a sanitized, glistening shine, your young son with "questionable aim" has to use the bathroom. Back to Square One.

The just-emptied dishwasher quickly gathers many a newly-dirtied dish.

Cars need oil changes, houses need fresh coats of paint, lightbulbs and batteries need to be changed.

The maintenance is never done, and won't be until we breathe our last.

Even the second law of thermodynamics says that things are constantly moving from a state of order to a state of disorder (That's a little shout-out to my science teacher husband, and quite possibly the most academic statement I've ever used on this blog!!).

And it's the case in our own personal relationship with Jesus Christ. It takes zero effort to drift away from Him. He doesn't move away from us, but when we forego what it takes to maintain an intimate relationship with Him, we find ourselves far from where we want to be.

It takes zero maintenance to realize we haven't prayed in a week. Or two.

It requires no effort on your part to go a month without opening your Bible.

It takes nothing to end up thinking, speaking, deciding, acting and reacting like this world does.

But is that what we really want?

We were created for an intimate, life-altering relationship with the One who made us. But it takes maintenance.

Praying. Reading the Word. Serving as He did. Being in fellowship with other followers.

And while it takes investments of love, sacrifices of time, laying down our lives, and taking up our cross daily (read: a lot of work!), we were made for the abundant life that results from the maintenance of our relationship with Jesus.

There will be a day when we breathe our last and the laundry and errands and dishwashing and obligations will all end.

But this relationship with our God will go on and on. For we were also made for the eternal life that results from a relationship with Jesus.