Avoidance

BIBLICAL POINT OF REFERENCE:

"Many deceivers have gone out into the world, those who do not acknowledge Jesus Christ as coming in the flesh; such is the deceitful one and the antichrist. Look to yourselves that you do not lose what we worked for but may receive a full recompense. Anyone who is so 'progressive' as not to remain in the teaching of the Christ does not have God; whoever remains in the teaching has the Father and the Son. If anyone comes to you and does not bring this doctrine, do not receive him in your house or even greet him; for whoever greets him shares in his evil works."

~2 John 1:7-11

Have you ever had someone call you, but you don't want to talk to that person, so you just ignore the call and hope they don't call again? Or have you ever been invited to hang out with someone but either you don't want to hang out with person or you don't like the activity you'd be doing, so you just give some excuse not to go? Basically, have you ever avoided a situation in whatever way(s) possible? I always feel super guilty in these kind of situations; I have to question why I am avoiding who or what I am avoiding. When in doubt, I try to do the right thing, but I get scared and intimidated just like everyone else, and sometimes I let it rule over my better judgement. Why do I bring this up? Because in a couple weekends there is a family event that I am trying to avoid, but I wonder if it is the right thing or not to avoid it. And there is no easy answer: Each situation that involves ignoring something is going to be different, and what you decide should be based on multiple things, such as who you're trying to avoid, why you're trying to avoid him or her, and what the consequences will be should you choose to avoid him or her. Yeah, I've taken all of these things into consideration, and it's brought me to a question: Am I avoiding what God wants me to face, or am I simply avoiding something that isn't necessary to attend? Maybe this doesn't seem like a big deal; people avoid stuff all the time after all, and usually it is because of a fairly logical reason that I don't need to know unless the situation concerns me. But my argument is that if you don't take time to work through the little things, the big things get a whole lot harder to sort out. So I want to do this the right way -which would be a whole lot easier if I knew what the right way was. So I'll let us all ponder this: Is avoiding the person or event going to bring you closer or farther away from God? If you don't know, have you tried praying about it? This is another question I've been asking myself lately, because I seem to have forgotten that prayer can lead you closer to God and that He has already sent us all out thousands of invitations to talk to Him. So here are my takeaways from this article: 1) You can avoid situations with people, but you can't avoid God and what He is calling you to forever; 2) think about what brings you closer to God, because it may be that the situation you are trying to avoid will do just that; and 3) when in doubt, pray to God for guidance. As always, I am continually praying and hear to listen ladies! Your Laughing Sister, Callahan

Check out the REGRET and PRAYER quotes pages for more inspiration!