Being a sinner causes me to walk closer to Him

I'm so messed up.  I'm such a sinner.

Seems like no matter how much I try I fall to sin's calling and temptations.  I fall down, cry...get back up, only to fall again.

I've come to the realization that as much as it hurts to admit:  I don't like suffering.  Rather, I should say I want to choose what I will suffer for and deny myself of what I choose to deny myself of.

Often times, I will do almost anything to avoid pain.  I pick and choose, though, I call it by another name.  God calls us to be willing and prepared to do His will.

Whatever His will is, even if it means that I must hurt, suffer, or  become BROKEN.

Once we are obedient to God and do what He has called us to, sin then looses its grip on us.

Have you noticed how when we are in bodily pain, or our health or the health of our love one is in jeopardy our values become clear and, sinful pleasures, whatever they might be, become bleak and less important?

Let's remember this:  When we suffer for doing right and we obey in spite of our suffering we have made a clean break with sin and God is pleased.

Therefore, since Christ has suffered in the flesh, arm yourselves also with the same purpose, because he who has suffered in the flesh has ceased from sin. ~ 1 Peter 4:1

In light of knowing this about myself: I'm forced to get up...when most are sleeping and sit at His feet.  We talk.  I talk He listens. He speaks and I listen.  It's my favorite time of my day, when my Father and I are intimate.  This is what I need. Bread.  THE BREAD OF LIFE.

I come to the garden alone
While the dew is still on the roses
And the voice I hear falling on my ear
The Son of God discloses.

And He walks with me, and He talks with me,
And He tells me I am His own;
And the joy we share as we tarry there,
None other has ever known.

He speaks, and the sound of His voice,
Is so sweet the birds hush their singing,
And the melody that He gave to me
Within my heart is ringing.

I’d stay in the garden with Him
Though the night around me be falling,
But He bids me go; through the voice of woe
His voice to me is calling.

"And we have the word of the prophets made more certain, and you will do well to pay attention to it, as to a light shinning in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your heart." ~ 1 Peter 1:19