Wilderness

It's Thursday night, which means I'm tired.  By this point in the week, I'm simply exhausted, and no amount of caffeine can get me to 8pm without heavy eyelids.  I am downright nasty when I'm tired.  Kirsten the Terrible.  Just ask my husband.  I read into things, I snap back with an ugly tone in my voice, I make assumptions, I glare, I pick fights.  I play martyr.  I pout.  I roll my eyes.  Just go to bed, a voice of reason says inside my head.  Go to bed before you do more damage.  But I don't, not for a while.  Not before throwing out a few more jabs and selfish grumblings.

So I'm putzing around in the book of Matthew, reading slowly, absorbing, without agenda.  Kind of like meandering down a path in the wilderness, without a timeline for when I have to be back.  Stopping to smell a flower, watch a bird, skip stones in the creek.  Yesterday I stumbled along the first verse of chapter four:

"Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil."

The Devil did not lead Jesus into the wilderness.  The Spirit did!  Because of the desperation and strong temptations presented in those forty days and nights, we know Jesus has known human suffering.  We know He knows what it's like to be tempted.  We also know that we can trust that Jesus was in fact without sin.  What a gift Jesus has given us by going through this!   Jesus went without food for forty days and nights.  Forty!  I get crabby if I miss breakfast.  He had the power to turn the stones into bread as Satan suggested.  He had the power to escape the wilderness.  But He didn't.  He was obedient, under the most dire of circumstances.  It's not just that Jesus said "no" to the temptations the Devil laid out before Him; it's that he said "no" and magnified God through quoting scripture when he was starving.  When he was hurting, alone, weak, wasting away. 

And tonight, when I'm simply tired- not starving, not wasting, not lonely- just sleepy- I fell into the temptation to be unkind. 

I am super-blessed to have a forgiving husband, who lets these things go, Thursday after Thursday.  And how blessed I am that I can meander in God's Word, come back to Him, and He forgives me Thursday after Thursday too.  Amen.

A New Perspective

Balance. 

That's one of my New Year's Resoluntions, or rather, a goal. 

I'm not talking about try to juggle housekeeping with a full time job, being a mother and wife, working on relationships, etc. I have that completely squared away with no problem.

Oh! But I'm kidding.  It's not squared away, but it never will be; the balance will always shift.  It's always going to feel like one of those tabletop maze games, the ones where the maze is encased in a box, and you gently try to tip the box in different directions to guide the small silver ball down the paths of the maze to end up in the center.  I will always be trying to over-and-under-compensate pressure and time in all areas to get that ball rolling somewhere towards the middle.  It's just a fact of life, that it will always be tipping one way or other.

The balance that I'm wanting to work on is one of getting myself back into peace.  Peace so that my evenings where I come home angry and crabby after a tough day at work become fewer.  Peace so that I take a deep breath when I'm cut off in traffic, and realize it's not a big deal.  Peace so that I give myself slack when I'm late, when I forget things, when I'm hurting. 

I need a spiritual makeover. 

I'm beinning to realize, and God is beginning to teach me, that I have been confusing discipline with heartfelt commitment.  When I began to really know God personally in my high school years, I began to learn about daily Bible studies and quiet time.  I took suggestions for how to spend this daily devotion to heart, and practiced them, well, religiously.  The messages I kept hearing was to read Scripture, meditate on it, and write about it.  Journal thoughts, or think of a way it applies to my life and write it down.  And pray, of course, pray. 

I did this every day for years.  Like, 17 years.  Sometimes I varied by using devotional books, but I applied the same concept: read the devotional verses, or do the study questions, then write something about it.  This was good practice, and it's a great idea for personal study.  But I often find that I'm writing in that journal just because I'm "supposed to."  I felt repetitious.  I was repititious.  On "off" days, I wrote things that were half-hearted, boring, obvious.  I'm stuck. 

This past year, I followed a daily devotional for mothers.  It was okay.  But I found myself wanting to just get my Bible open, not this little book with a verse or two a day.  And how odd...I felt like I had to finish the book before I could change up my devotions.  What is it about finishing a book, what is it about following someone else's recommendations without deviance, that fits in with my spiritual growth?  The truth is that it doesn't.  The truth is that habit does not mean devotion.  Following regimen does not mean following God.

I'm doing something daring.  I'm reading my Bible.  And that's it.  Just.  Reading.  And sitting.  No regimen, except to do it every day.  No minimum number of verses.  No journaling (unless I feel like it).  No minimum time.  I'm letting myself linger over the words, sit still with it, sit still with God.  He is there.

Today I really went crazy.  I listened to quiet music while I read (Gasp! Music!), and I had a cookie and some milk.  Because I felt like it.  Because the music actually helped me to be quieter.  Because, sitting in my flannel pajamas, coming to the Word with no requirement, no assignment, it felt right tonight to celebrate that God's Word is comfort.  That I am free to think, pray, and read the Bible in different ways.  It's a new perspective, and I already feel that God is blessing me through the simplicity of me just sitting with Him for a while, without agenda.  I'm coming back to Him.

Amen.