Last night was a late night for me. I’ve never been one to have issues falling asleep, but I could tell from the evenings events I was pretty alert and processing a lot of thoughts so I opted to stay up and watch a favorite show on Netflix.

Sadly, I can always expect to want to sleep in the next morning whenever this happens.

Today was different. I threw the covers off, surprised at my alertness, and fixed my first cup of tea to get things started right. It didn’t take long before I was sitting in my favorite chair, sipping tea, sleep still in my eyes, as I continued processing this “truth” that’s been on my heart for weeks.

I read a quote in my “What is Love” Bible study by Kelly Minter that said this:

Walking in the truth, or living in truth revealed in Jesus Christ affects everything: our attitudes, flavor of conversations, sexual behavior, use of money and time, tone of our voices, what we watch and listen to, the words we speak. Truth lays down the path on which God calls us to walk.

I kept thinking about this in the context of the world of relationships around me. Without judging myself or others, I tried to send myself back to the past and how it was I chose to live life many years ago. At the time, it honestly didn’t seem all that bad. I’ve always been honest. I’ve always had a caring heart. I’m a listener and I typically have patience to get through tough moments with most people. Good things, people. Good things.

In the absence of truth, however, I now know that it sure looked a lot different.

It’s all about abiding, y’all. And it hurts like crazy when you see someone struggling to abide in Him because their lives begin to look nothing like the quote above. Truth is, walking in truth is like putting yourself on autopilot. When our minds choose to abide in Him daily (and I know I’ve said this over and over again, but it’s a choice), we honestly don’t have to try.

We feel the pain of trying to walk another way.

I’ve taken a little blog break over the last month. It happens a lot. Not because I don’t love to write, but because I’ve needed more time to study and pray than anything else and Instagram makes a quick way to wrap up my thoughts as I hear from Him in record time. But it’s harder for me to go back and retrace my steps and relocate those words when I need them most.

…and I need to remember these words, guys.

So I decided to get on here today and just process. It used to be about meticulously picking a theme and spending a lot of time on a post. Now…I just want to share my heart as you watch me walk through the ins-and-outs of these truth discoveries. And I know I can do it here or Instagram or in my journal and it’s all good.

It’s not how well I clean my house or perfect the meal is when you come over for dinner. It’s not whether or not you’re in my circle of friends or circle of acquaintances or circle of people I love in Christ, but just don’t see eye-to-eye with on a whole lot of other things. It’s not about new clothes I buy or how much weight I lose on a lifestyle change for the benefit of better health. It’s not a comparison act on how well I’m raising my children or how well you are. It’s not about biting my tongue during the current election or choosing to let it loose on how absolutely utterly ridiculous it is. And it’s certainly not about how many times a week I get a post up on my blog or how many likes, comments, or compliments I receive on what I write.

Truth just doesn’t look like what I thought it should look like. Truth is about so much more than that.

It’s about abiding. And we walk dangerously close to the edge of falling off of that truth when we begin to loosen our desire to abide. Trying to live a clean and moral life and saying “yeah. I believe in Jesus,” isn’t enough.

Let’s link arms, friends. Abiding together is so much easier than abiding alone.

#thissideofgrace #abiding #morningmeditations

Linking up with the following authors this week:

Holly S. Barrett for Testimony Tuesday

Kelly Ballerie for RaRa Linkup

Jennifer Dukes Lee for #TellHisStory

Holley Gerth and Coffee For Your Heart

Kristin Hill Taylor for Three Word Wednesday