UPGRADE: 6 vital ways to level up your life

My children laugh that I am not 'tech savvy'. It is a family joke that I only recently discovered I can change the colours of my phone file folders and add emojies 😁. I am just not very interested in the latest gadgets and prefer a simple life. I am disorientated after they automatically upgrade and wonder if they are actually functioning better?

BUT over the past few days I have kept seeing and hearing the word 'UPGRADE'.

There is a challenge from heaven to 'Level Up' in this season. To resist the comfort of the familiar, the security of the known and push forward and upward for sharper focus in a stumbling world.

Upgrade; to improve, to exchange for something greater, to raise to a higher grade, position, or standard.

I love how different definitions include adding or replacing new components!

We need some vital additions to upgrade NOW and function with improved standards!

1. Upgrade our Perspective

There is always more to see than we like to look for. We default to focus on the tree in front of our eyes rather than the horizon ahead.

We need to go up higher.

"Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth." Colossians 3:2

True expanded sight carries weighty ressponsibility for its reality.

2) Upgrade our Expectations

Lower the standard; lower the result.

It is not the kingdom way!

Compromise is the road with daisies.

We choose the path with potholes; believing for opportunities to grow, solutions to fill uncomfortable hole challenges and a life with purpose and direction.

3) Upgrade our Speech.

Criticism and judgement are subtle. Grenades of insult and division spurt out of our mouths with little thought for where they land.

Remember how our tongue is a fire with the power of life and death? (James 3).

How easily it runs wild.

Upgrade and Choose a Better Way.

We must practice improved standards of life-giving words!

Removing our partnership with complaining, grumbling, and tearing down.

Releasing words of hope that explode and transform conversations.

Detonate different speech bombs of comfort, encouragement and wisdom which turn around atmospheres.

This is a NEW war of words!

4) Upgrade our Beliefs.

Things are increasingly shaken in these days but only so that the unshakeable remains (Hebrews 12:27). The kingdom of God can only be built with the unshakeable!

It is ok for things to fail and crumble. The falling reveals the substandard materials and shoddy workmanship.

The dissolve and dismantle is not a loss. It creates wide new spaces for the new unwavering, lasting construction that is needed for moving forward.

No cutting corners for this rebuild!

5) Upgrade our Response

One of my favourite verses is 1 John 3:18

"Let us not love in words or tongue but in actions and in truth."

Love is always about actions; that is why we can recognise it when we see it. We know what it looks like!

Gentleness from the exhausted Mama comforting her feverish, crying baby.

Kindness from the man who gave his lunch to the homeless.

Patience from the teacher with his struggling student.

Forgiveness is probably never deserving but we offer freedom anyway.

Our actions define who we are and what we really stand for. It is the only measure of love.

The mustard seed faith that can move mountains is not about the positive thoughts or beliefs in our head but the tiny movement actions we take. The power is in the momentum of action.

The small things of love and faith matter!

This is the level up!

6) Upgrade our Commitment

Dictionaries define commitment as a promise, pledge, or obligation. It requires a decision and dedication.

Commitment is once again an action in response to God. It is not theory, knowledge, or self-generated empowerment.

True commitment is evidenced by how we live. How we respond to pain, crisis, fear, or uncertainty. Commitment is a life entrusted to a purpose greater than self. It involves sacrifice; not once or twice but without counting.

"No one has greater love [nor stronger commitment] than to lay down his own life for his friends." John 15:13

A life laid down may seem like a self-downgrade. Another dismantling!

But it is the GREATER kingdom upgrade!

The components look simple on paper but challenge the everyday moments!

Light seemingly shines brighter as the darkness increases.

Upgrading increases the light!

Darkness must pass; a new day will come, and when the sun shines, it will shine out the clearer.”

J.R. Tolkien