i’m wearing two pairs of kneesocks because my toes are turning blue and yes, i really am that cold.
on the way home from small group tonight i realized i had a flat tire.
when i got home at 9:15, everyone was in bed and asleep.
i guess we’ve all had one of those days.
i get so mixed up sometimes about what matters and what doesn’t really matter, what i should care about and what i don’t need to care about. that’s when i start wishing to be in a convent.
i didn’t have a time with God this morning because i wanted to run a work-related errand before work. i took my bible with me so i could read in the car after i was finished with my errand, but that took longer than i expected and i didn’t have any time available before i had to go in to our office.
at lunch i did another errand and registered for a couple of things i’d been meaning to get to but hadn’t yet. i didn’t read my bible then, either.
i don’t want to just check items off my “holy stuff” list and feel good about myself for “doing what i’m supposed to.” i know that, as j.d. greear says in gospel, there’s nothing i can do to make God love me more, and there’s nothing i have done that can make Him love me less.
but.
(i know, there’s not supposed to be a “but.”)
but if i run out the door without having spent time alone and unharried with God, what does that say about me or my priorities or motivations?
am i supposed to feel guilty?
am i not supposed to feel guilty?
am i supposed to be okay with it?
what am i supposed to do?
i failed, obviously. who did i fail? why? how?
was it really failure?
in Christ, “failure” isn’t supposed to matter so much. we are completely loved and accepted by God in Christ, so we have the freedom to fail and to get back up and start again.
but what does that really mean?
or, i know what it means, but what does it look like? when i fail, do i get upset because i failed God, or because i failed myself, or because i failed someone else’s idea of what i should be/do, or because i failed my idea of someone else’s idea of what i should do?
“for you were called to freedom, brothers — only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh.”
what does true freedom truly look like?
when jacob wrestled with God he said “i won’t let You go until You bless me.”
when God wrestles with me, do i wrestle back or just put my hands up and refuse to grip and grapple and hold on for dear life?
i wrote a little song once. it wasn’t very good, but it expressed what i was feeling at the time. i’d forgotten about it until the other day when it came randomly to mind. it summed up well what i was feeling then, too.
i wish i could hold you
and make everything okay
i wish i could shake you
make you wake up to life
i wish i could heal the hurt
and take it all away
but i’m a fragile human too
made of glass and clay
and i crumble as i watch
you fade away …
well.
give me eyes to see with, ears to hear with, a mind to understand and a heart to love with.
awake my soul, Lord, for i am blind, deaf, dull and dead.
o Love ever burning and never extinguished caritas, my God, set me on fire.
— augustine
amen.
