Settling In
I moved into my new apartment in Dallas a month ago, and now I’ve been making this my home. My boxes have been gradually unpacked. My roommate and I assembled an Ikea desk together. I bought a bookshelf and wired up my stereo. It feels like my life is coming together. After some stress, I got my job back and settled into the work routine. My finances are even stabilizing. I’m building study habits for my new classes and establishing new friendships in my community. I guess you’d say I’m settling in.
After a summer of constant transitions—travelling all over the U.S., working in 3 states and visiting friends and family in a few more—I’m no longer living out of a suitcase. I've finally settled into a location, routines… comfort.
I must be careful when I become “settled.” My tendency is to forget my need for God when I “have my life in order.” When I don’t know how things will turn out, I spend a lot more time in prayer asking God to intervene.
One of the hardest things about being a Christian in America is that we have everything we need here. Wealth grants us security. We tend to forget God, rationalize our independence, ignore the spiritual realm. I appall myself with thoughts of such heresy. Yet in the history of my experience, when I am “settled”, I quickly boost my pride and confidence in myself, and quickly develop complacency with sin in my life. The result is that I turn from God, and I no longer have room for Him in my life. But it doesn’t have to be this way.
How do you fight complacency when settling in? Comfort isn’t bad, but how do we avoid the dangers that physical security poses to our spiritual lives?
I have to surround myself with truth, to fall back on disciplines I sought to develop in healthy times of life. The prophet Isaiah writes, “Seek the LORD while he may be found; call upon him while he is near” (Is. 55:6). Isaiah is not saying that God is going to hide from us, but instead telling us to seek God even—especially—in the good times. Don’t wait until your storm comes to turn to God. While your life is going well, acknowledge God.
As a Christian, I have another perspective I must bring to mind: this world is not my home.
Jesus said, “My kingdom is not of this world” (John 18:36). The Kingdom that we Christians speak of and live for is an eternal governance by God—a rightly ordered universe. Jesus tells me I do not belong here; I have a home in another realm.
Maybe you need to hear the call of John the Baptizer: “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand” (Matthew 3:2). He lovingly beckons: turn now, because soon divine order will be restored to the earth. That order involves judgment. Make sure you’re on the right side.
Life is short—too short to “settle in.” We don’t have the time to get caught up in petty things. I follow Jesus because I believe he came to the earth as God incarnate, sent by His Father, so that He might act as a substitutionary atonement for my guilt of sin by His death upon the cross. God becoming man is the most beautiful thing that ever happened on earth, yet it’s hard to believe in the midst of comfort.
Now that the weather in Dallas has cooled down for the fall, I can cozy up under the awesome new quilt I got from my friend’s mom. I feel secure, comfortable. How will I avoid letting that comfort keep me in bed, paralyze me from a useful life? I will daily renew my mind and attitude by reading the words God gave us in the Bible. I will become a man of prayer, so that I will be continually reminded of my utter need for God, who loves me and hears me. I will develop habits of discipline, not free-floating through life, but creating diligent study habits, rigorous exercise routines, sleeping well, eating well, and loving others well. I will be grateful, praising God with thanksgiving for who He is and how He has blessed me. Why would I settle for less?