What if God asked me to explain myself before every situation I was attempting? How many meaningless things would I find myself in? How many less hurtful experiences would I probably have saved myself? Countless ones.
But what if God asked me to explain myself after every situation I committed to? Sure, the ones that look good on a personal resume would be gladly explained. Voluntarily explained in fact. Yes, I gave to the homeless. Oh, I sure did lead Bible study last week. Those I’d be proud of.
But what about those other times? Those situations that occur more than I’d like to think of. What about the person I hung up on? What about that person I yelled at? Even more so, what about that person I disrespected? How would I care to explain those times?
Nobody’s perfect. We all know that. And it’s important that we understand that God knows it too. He doesn’t expect perfection out of us, but He does expect our best. He expects us to make mistakes. He expects us to not get it right all the time. He expects us to say the wrong thing sometimes and to do the wrong thing.
He does however expect us to get better. He does expect us to not do the things wrong that we’ve learned were wrong countless times before. That’s why I believe that if I were to stop before every “tough” situation and ask myself, how will I explain this to God, I’d be better off.
How will I explain this to you God? How many people can you hang up on, how many people can you yell at, how many times can you disrespect someone when you’re approaching the situation with that mindset?
The truth is, that’s the mindset we should always have. Because believe it or not, one day we’re going to have to explain ourselves. We’re going to have to look at those times that we opted out of a godly approach for a humanistic one. We’re going to have to look back, and I’m sure some of us will be really hurt by what we’ll see.
Knowing that, I can’t help but get it together! I have got to do better. When God asks me how do I explain what I’ve done when I knew how to do better, saying I don’t know wont cut it. When it comes time, how are you going to explain yourself?
Matthew 12:36 (NLT)
And I tell you this, you must give an account on judgment day for every idle word you speak.
Romans 14:12 (NLT)
Yes, each of us will give a personal account to God.