Why I Return Shopping Carts (And Why I Should Return Them)

Have you ever returned a shopping cart, wheeling it two aisles away from your car, because that is what a good citizen would do? Have you ever read your daughter a bedtime story because that is what a good parent should do?  Have you ever rounded up your tithe check because, well, that is what a good Christian would do?

You have?! What a jerk!  Kidding, kidding...

Okay, truthfully, I've been guilty of all of thee above- and more than once, unfortunately. Guilt is so often my driving force.  I can carry out all the appropriate actions that are expected of me, without any of the lovey-dovey, happy feelings accompanying them.

I'm not going to sit here and tell you that we should only slow for yellow lights when we don't feel rushed, or how we aren't called to rub our sore husband's back unless we want to... Common sense says sometimes we have to do what we don't feel like- there are social, legal, and religious laws that summarize some of these obligations.

What I am going to say is that we are seriously settling in these situations, when we accept our begrudging attitudes.  Life in Christ offers so much more.  Not just the way to live, but the desires for true life.

When my daughter holds up her finger for "One mo" book at bedtime, I want to read it because I enjoy pouring time and love into her. When I clear someone else's table, I want it to be doing it out of gratefulness.  I want to like, love, and live what I do- not just go through the motions and check off my checklist!

And what's more, God doesn't want me to live that way either.  He is no more pleased with my obligatory giving or bitter sacrifices than he is with the one who doesn't have time to return the shopping cart or misses a tithe check.

God didn't create us to live under the burden of "doing the right thing just to do the right thing", he  wants us to do the right thing because we are overflowing with the Right One.  Really, that is the only way we can fully enjoy doing anything... To, as my husband so profoundly put it, "Don't try to enjoy anything more or less... just enjoy God most"!!