Walking my talk...

How can we ever preach/teach something we have never actually learned? We can't. Our actions will always speak louder than our words. This is why we must first learn before we can teach others.

This truth has really hit home to me this weekend as I struggled with maintaining purity within a relationship/friendship. In fact, even though I didn't lose the battle physically (which is only because of distance), I did lose it mentally and verbally, which is just as much of a loss as losing it physically.

This morning, during my prayer time, I realized that I have been choosing boys/men over obedience to God for a long time. In first grade I had my first experience with this scenario. There was a little boy that I really, really liked and I wanted him to like me. One day, the teacher told us we all had to wear our boots when we went outside because it was a wet, rainy, muddy day. Well, the boy I liked didn't wear his boots. For some reason, I thought that he would like me more if I did what he did, so I also didn't wear my boots. Being who I am, someone who can't get away with anything, I got caught and was destined to be punished for my disobedience. I had never been punished or really even disciplined in my life so far (I had been a naturally obedient child up until this day), so I was quite devastated by the thought and the teacher ended up not disciplining me as my mother intervened on my behalf.

As innocent as all of this was, there are a couple of principles coming into play in this situation that I now know helped to create the issues I am still struggling with right now. First of all, although my teacher wasn't God, she was in authority over me and I was to obey and submit to her authority as an indirect obedience and authority to God (Romans 13:1). I didn't obey her, instead I chose pleasing a boy over pleasing my teacher (or indirectly God) through obedience.

Secondly, my mother intervened, not allowing me to experience any consequences of my choice to disobey. Would the consequences of my disobedience have scarred me for life? Unlikely. Therefore, it probably would have been beneficial for me to experience the consequences as a deterrent of future disobedience in the same area.

Not that I'm trying to blame others (my teacher or my mother) for the choices I make today. I'm not, but remembering that experience helped me to understand when my problem of choosing men over God actually started and allowed me to ask forgiveness for my original sin and all that have followed.

Unfortunately, this also doesn't mean that the problem is gone, never to be an issue again. Habits don't usually die that quickly and I've been choosing men over obedience to God for many years. But, I do believe that it is the first step and maybe the most important one in the battle towards purity in relationships.