Monday

Last week I began a new Bible Study at church. The theme is learning to allow the Holy Spirit to guide your own personal Bible studies…and a feature is using journaling in your prayer time. I came home with 5 pages of homework and a few directives that to me just immediately were guilt inducing pointed….kinda like remember such and such says Thou Shalt… words that don’t invite me to spend time in the word, but words that were meant to guilt me into the Word. Been there?
Each day I looked at my 5 pages of worksheets and I would read a little and overlook them, but to obey them was not happening day one and two. “not for me” I’d say and then go on. But as the week drew on, I was drawn in to the content of the lessons….and to write/journal the responses and to look up the verses….after ignorning the opening comments some days…..to avoid again that pragmatic “you have to….or else” statements. Satan does use us as pawns sometimes doesn’t he? I am sure the leader did not write them with guilt intended, and this guilt I assure you wasn’t of God either…..it was the old hell raiser himself who was messing with me….
As the study progressed on my own and in my quiet time with God this week, something came to light….that I feel guilty about a world of things all the time. That I worry about offending and feel almost doomed to always offend…..and truthfully some of the folks I work so hard to keep from offending…well, bluntly….it’s their issue….and I need to get on with my life, albeit kindly, but I am so out of bounds worrying about issues they are creating.
The biggest thing was that I sketched many pages of what being my best me would look like to me. I listed who I would be, who I would like to be in some areas, and I affirmed things I already am. “Am I being my best me?” became the ruler on things like loving me enough to clean the kitchen so I wake up with it done? Choosing to find balance in the schedule so there is play time, ice skate time, relax with a favorite magazine time? Am I taking the 3 minutes I love to do to look like my husband and I both prefer…polished and made up? Am I taking the time to visit with the folks at church I often hurry out the door and only wave as I go by?
Les and I had real talks all week about the way I feel responsible for so many things with so many people. This last year had been a year of unthreading so many things that I could clearly see were no longer needed in our lives. Drama producing things that we simply needed to say “no” to. We created more of our own traditions, spent more time looking inside our family instead of trying to worry about those outside of it so much. Best of all, when I began explaining how God had challenged me to tell him and write down who this “best me” was……He began thinking on that path too. We know that God has a plan for the two of us, we’ve been affirmed in that for a long time…..and while the exit for that plan hasn’t fully come up on our highway yet…..we know we’re looking for it and preparing for it in things he has brought us to.
Am I at peace? Do I know I am loved? Can I trust Him for everything? Do I know how much the past truly is truly over? Those are things that God seemed to be whispering all week. The trust one is breathtaking enough with nothing else involved. ….and I am still working on that…trusting that what comes comes…that God has it covered…and that He is enough. Period, if I will trust him, rely on Him, lean into him, and allow him.
For a girl who had to fight tooth and nail to make myself attend 9 a.m. Tuesday…and then avoided the work for two more days….I’d say there’s a plan in this obedience……and I’m going to see it out….every day….time alone different than my usual time with God….time walking this out with Him.
God is good, I have to cling to that when sisters in my life are hurting as two families have this week over the loss of a very wanted babe…..when a child faces an illness that takes my breath away….when answers aren’t printed and handed out at the church door…. but God so loves us, so offers us peace and rest …..I will trust in His promises, His Word and I will choose to trust Him.