Most people have difficulty especially with Monday mornings. We might press the "snooze" button more than once and occasionally even be late for work. Avoiding the inevitable isn't a solution at all. We all find ourselves facing the music of schedules, attending to our needs, and getting out of bed! I know this will upset some people; but I am a morning person. One of those who is up between five and six most mornings of my life! On the opposite end of the spectrum I'm usually ready to head to bed by ten. Just the way my system works. Yours may work the same or you might need to sleep till noon. Eventually, everyone has to go to bed and everyone has to get up. What state of mind we have is still a choice to each of us. Many people go to bed dreading waking and going through the motions of another day. Many people live for five and off work! There are little interruptions we all deal with though. They are called responsibilities. When we wake up (no matter how), we still need to engage the day before us. That's when the rubber meets the road. For the Christian, each of us should wake with a sense of newness and positive anticipation of what God is going to do in and through us every day. Not necessarily knowing the outcome but knowing He is in charge and he has a plan for our day.
Society and how we were raised plays an important part of our makeup driving our attitudes in life. For instance, I grew up on a farm in the Midwest where we were expected to be up and working by seven or eight at the latest. We worked until dark. No wonder farm kids look forward to school starting in the fall! We still were up early as we were picked up by the bus at seven every morning. We also had responsibilities at home. So, at four thirty we were dropped off by the bus, changed clothes and went to work at whatever needed to be done. Our lives were conditioned to hard work and lots of it. As a Christian and now retired, I appreciate the work ethic I was taught. God has a work ethic for the Christian as well. We can choose whether or not we want to do the will of God and therein lies a problem. If we treated our Christian lives as we do in the natural world, much would be accomplished for God all around us. Rather than dreading waking in the morning, we may even look forward to what God brings involving us in His work. It doesn't really take much but it does require us to listen to the Holy Spirit when we are told to do this or that. What would happen if we went to bed excited about what was going to take place tomorrow? What if all Christians would have this attitude? Would you see changes in and around you? I know that I do.
I'm retired. That means I don't have any employer expectations or pressures. But, I do have stuff I have to do and as time moves on my list grows. How I deal with that list and the needs pressed upon me by God, myself and other people determines what my day is going to be like. BUT, the first step for all of us is to wake up spiritually before we wake up physically. How we incorporate Christ in our lives and listen to the Holy Spirit set the tone for tomorrow should we be fortunate enough to have another day. It's always my choice. I can choose to have a miserable day and sometimes I do. I regret it afterwards but I still have made that choice. I can choose to be resentful of interruptions to my day and irritate myself and the people around me, but I still have made the choice. I'm not a 100% happy camper! I'd like to say I was but then I'd be lying. There are circumstances that are thrust upon each of us where we make the choice of either living the Christian life or living how the world wants us to live. The world wants us unbalances, angry, dissatisfied, confused, frustrated and other adjectives that lack the peace of God. Most of the time I choose to go for that which renders the peace of God. Remember, it's always your choice as well.
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