In one of the hard, ugly crying seasons of my life a friend with good intentions commented on one of the blog posts I had written. In the comment, she said sometimes we need to apply some elbow grease. I was so mad when I read this comment. However, as I began to think about the comment and then I began to pray about it. I wanted to know what this looked like applied to my life.
You see God does work in our lives. I 100% believe this with all of my heart. I know that there have been times when God had aligned the stars and put certain places, relationships, and jobs into my life. However, in most of these situations, I had done the hard work and had begun to lay the foundation for the opportunity to open up to me. Take Camp Redcloud for example. While I had never spent hours and hours at a barn, I had spent hours and hours with youth. I had led a college campus ministry and had gained leadership experience in other ways. Applying the barn to my hard work ethics and my leadership experience allowed me to pick up the things I needed to learn easier. However, I had to show up at the barn every day. I put in hours, days, and months of riding to get to a place where they would trust me to lead a trail ride on my own.
I can pray and pray for God to clean my bathroom, but the reality is a human is going to clean my bathroom. God may have someone knock on my door and tell me God told them to clean my bathroom. I am sure it has happened. It’s the kind of thing my loving father would do. But, he may also ask you to stand up, get a rag and cleaning supplies. Then go and scrub the bathroom.
Then today while I was folding laundry I was thinking about the process of oiling something. Sometimes before elbow grease can be applied sanding, cleaning, and polishing has to take place. If all you do is pour the grease in but there are wholes in the pipes it will just leak out.
In my life, today, I need to start eating healthy, exercising, drinking more water, and intentionally putting nutrition into my body. Applying elbow grease will almost always come at a cost to us. It may be hiring a cleaning lady to clean the bathroom. It may be in the supplies to clean it yourself. You have to decide what sacrifice needs to be made and then take steps towards that direction. It will also usually begin with fear being a real hurdle you have to conquer. But, again, the wonderful thing is you don’t have to do it alone. God will go with you and if you are a believer he lives inside of you.
What elbow grease do you need to apply to your life? Is it relationships? Is it education? Is it D. all of the above like my life usually is? God does provide, but we also have to be willing to do the hard work.
Elbow grease also requires naps. I have never been so tired in my whole life as when I started to really put pressure into applying the elbow grease. I was never a nap taker before. I am now! Lol.
Also, start today. Right now. Don’t wait. After you push past your fear then your application gets smoother and smoother, you will wonder why you didn’t start sooner.
I will be lifting you up in prayer and cheering you on as you conquer fear after fear. God’s got you 100%, now go move mountains.