My parents have a no texting after 9:30 rule. And I never really understood it, so honestly I didn't really concern myself with it. I still followed it for the most part, but I didn't think much of it. I wish I had, but I didn't.
This past week I had been talking to a new friend of mine quite a bit, and I kept texting after 9:30. Everyone else is usually in bed by that point, so I just never really cared, I did it and nobody knew about it.
But Saturday night, I was praying. I don't feel like I'm close enough to God. I don't always feel excited to spend time with him. I observe lots of people around me who are, and it upsets me because I want to be like that. I want to be closer to Him and have Him be my closest friend, and serve Him the best way I can. So I was praying, and asking Him what I could do to change that and be closer to Him. It hit me before I'd even finished praying: Stop disregarding that no texting after 9:30 rule!
So I thought about it. I'd already been grounded for breaking that rule a few months previously. Then I'd stopped doing it, but obviously it had come up again. I began to feel very guilty. How could I just take a rule and disregard it? For Colossians 3:20 says "Children, obey your parents in everything, for this pleases the Lord."
What made it worse was that I couldn't just stop doing it. I had to apologize, and I knew that. I had to apologize to the friends I had been talking to, and I had to apologize to my parents as well. That was really hard for me. My parents and I have a really great relationship, especially my dad. And it hurt me a lot to have to tell him that I had broken his trust. I really didn't want to do it, I wanted to just stop and hope he never found out and he would still trust me... But that's not real. And I knew that wasn't what God wanted. So I went to sleep, dreading the following day.
My dad is a pastor at our church, and he was preaching that day, so he was very busy that morning, and I had youth group in the afternoon. So all day I had to dread how he would react and what he would do when I told him.
That night, everyone in my family had gone to bed except my dad, and he was getting ready to. So, I knew I had to do it then. I grabbed my laptop and iPod and walked over to him, told him what I had done, apologized, and gave him my devices, ready to accept my grounding. Surprised, he asked me why I was telling him this. So I told him that what I had done was wrong, and I wanted him to be able to trust me. Then it was my turn to be surprised. My dad hugged me, gave me my devices back, and said that he did trust me. And then he went to bed. Shocked, I returned to my room to thank God.
However, I still had to apologize to my friends. It was after 9:30 at that point, so I had to wait until the next day. I got up the next morning, went to work, and when I got home, I messaged them and told them what I'd done, asked for their forgiveness, and to help keep me accountable in the future. Once again, to my surprise, they all totally understood and thanked me for letting them know, and agreed to help keep me accountable.
God has blessed me with such great friends and family! I'm so grateful for them. Now that I have all of that over with, I want to continue to change my life to better follow God's Word. I know that He has a plan, and I want to be part of it. And I encourage you: If there is a particular sin in your life that you know needs to be dealt with, I encourage you to do it! And make sure to apologize to anyone else involved. A good friend will understand the mistake and appreciate you even more for telling them the truth and apologizing!