Even ground

     Some days feel like it is all you can do to eat regular meals and remember to drink water and, oh, yeah, perhaps go to sleep at the end of it all.  And then somedays you remember how to breathe. Today was one of those days. Despite being an early morning, the majority of my day concluded early and I was released into a pleasant afternoon filled with casual social encounters and some quite time by myself. After my post from yesterday and my day of stillness today, I feel "reset."  Well, not quite. "Reset" implies that I have returned to ground zero and everything is normal which, of course, it never has been. Rather, it has been one of those days where life seems manageable and, contrary to yesterday's summary of my general apathetic state lately, today was a reminder that my life is not my own. To remind us of this fact, God sometimes bats at us with a giant paw to knock us off our self-created pedestals and out of our ruts of self-pity and self-absorption. Other times, like today, He quietly clears His throat in the library corner and points demurly to His latest handiwork. And you just smile. Because you know. And you thank Him for His graciousness and for His extreme generosity in letting you in on the process.

"Therefore, since we have this ministry, as we have received grace, we do not lose heart, but we have renounced the things hidden because of shame, not walking in craftiness or adulterating the word of God, but by the manifestation of truth commending ourselves to very man's conscience in the sight of God...For we do not preach ourselves but Christ Jesus as Lord, and ourselves as your bondservants for Jesus' sake." 2 Corinthians 4:1-3, 5
 

     As much as i would like it to be, my academic career or reputation is of no importance if I am not following God and His plan for my life. As much as I would love to be a million things and often (ashamedly) see my self as the bright and shining figurehead of Christianity's biggest breakthrough of the last 100 years, I know that God has many other things planned for me and that the limelight would be a gift too easy to squander for a heart as addicted to attention as mine is. It is a wonder He bothers to use us at all.

 

But He does.  What a gift!