Habits

September 7, 2021 Jim Musser

A few years ago, I decided to cut down significantly the amount of sugar that was in my diet. I knew where it needed to start—my coffee. For much of my adult life, I probably drank 3-5 mugs (I say mugs because only at restaurants did I use 8-ounce cups!) of coffee per day, and with each mug of coffee, I used a teaspoon of sugar. It was a deeply ingrained habit.

I remember distinctly that first week of drinking coffee without sugar. The first day, the taste was not very good. I wasn’t sure at that point how this experiment was going to go. However, the second day I noticed some improvement; the taste was more palatable. By the end of the week, I was enjoying my coffee again. From that point on, I have never put sugar in my coffee.

Another habit I developed as a young adult was reading the newspaper first thing in the morning. Later on, I went from the physical newspaper to an online version. I remember hearing Elizabeth Elliot say her approach to daily life was to begin with reading God’s Word and then she could have breakfast and read the newspaper. I dismissed that as a little too legalistic for me. I spent time in the Word, but at breakfast; however, her standard gnawed at me over the years. That gnawing, I am now convinced, was the conviction of the Holy Spirit, which I was resisting.

Finally, I decided to do what I felt compelled to do after years of resistance. One morning, I got up, made my morning coffee (sans sugar), grabbed my Bible and settled in for a time of reading and prayer. For years now, that has been my daily habit. And like my sugarless coffee habit, it seemed like an impossible one to form after so many years, but now I can’t imagine starting my day any other way.

All habits, good, bad, or in between, take some time to become ingrained, but then they become natural to us. To replace them, if we decide they are bad for us, takes intentionality, but the same rules apply. The more we do it consistently, the more natural it will become until, finally, it feels normal to do it.

As followers of Jesus, we are to examine our lives (Lamentations 3:40; I Corinthians 11:28; II Corinthians 13:5) This includes, of course, habits that get in our way of becoming who the Lord has created us to be. As David prayed in Psalm 139:23-24, we each should seek the Lord to show us what habits need to be changed or eliminated altogether in our lives.

Of course, this is a risky thing to do because he might ask us to give up something we currently hold dear or consider essential, something to which we cling. But we always need to remember that the Lord has our best interests in mind. If he is saying, “give this up,” then we would be wise to do it. In the short run, there is likely to be pain and/or discomfort, but over time it will become our new normal, a better normal.

When we decide to do this, the devil is going to stress how hard the change will be, perhaps even impossible. Change to a more godly habit or direction is an anathema to him. He will come against it with all he’s got to persuade us to remain as we are. But as Paul exhorts us, we must stand firm (Ephesians 6:14) and committed to change, remembering that all things are possible with God, not merely to change, but for that change to become our new way of life.