Hey! Ya' want fries with that?

I meet every Wednesday night with a great bunch of people...my Life Group. If you are in my Life Group and happen to be reading this...well....YOU ROCK! Anyway, tonight a young woman in our Life Group (she knows who she is...)made a very interesting observation....it is not an earth shattering observation but, it is something that we lose sight of often....we are a "fast food" society. By that she meant that we; you, me....virtually everybody, we want everything RIGHT NOW! Instant gratification, baby! Give me my stuff...the quicker the better! You know what? She is right. I mean look at our nation....every day we are trying to get what we want quicker. Efficiency has been replaced by speed. Manners have been replaced by "Whaddya have?". But, what ramifications does this "gimme mine, now!" attitude have on our spiritual lives? God certainly can perform 'right now' kinds of miracles...Jesus did it often....but, His disciples were with him for around 3 years before he revealed to them His true purpose in coming into the world....3 YEARS!! So what am I saying? Well...I'm simply saying that some things take time. Sometimes we have the same fast food attitude with our spiritual lives and it just doesn't work. God is constantly shaping us and forming us into His image. But, rather than trusting Him and being patient...we want to be Christ-like without the purification. We just refuse to understand, (well, maybe we do understand but refuse to accept) that shaping and forming us into the image of Christ is not an overnight thing. The potter doesn't sit at the wheel and crank out vases and urns in quick fashion....he takes his time to mold, shape and form the clay to be EXACTLY what he envisions it to be. Likewise, the blacksmith (are there any blacksmith's still hanging around?) doesn't grab a piece of steel and whack it with a hammer once or twice and forge a strong, long lasting sword. It takes much shaping, hammering, and sweating before the smithy is satisfied. So what makes us think that the Creator of the heavens and the earth would just blink His eyes and 'Bam!' we would be everything He meant for us to be? He did that once...does the name Adam ring any bells?....and look what happened there. The bottom line is this....we all have to stop this mad dash toward salvation. He gave us this wonderful gift...it is free for our asking...our check already paid. Stop treating Jesus like He is a cashier at our local burger joint and start believing that He is in control and bringing us all to a point where He wants us to be....Philippians 1:6 says, "And I am certain that God, who began the good work within you, will continue his work until it is finally finished on the day when Christ Jesus returns". We gotta wait, let our sculptor, God, do His thing...we are His masterpieces....but, we have to slow down...we have to be willing to forgo the urge to rush God...we have to wait and let the Potter mold His clay...besides...the long term rewards are much too great to rush and...too many fries are bad for you...