Drudgery. 2 Peter 1:5

In the Matter of Drudgery. You have inherited the Divine nature, says Peter (v.4), now screw your attention down and form habits, give diligence, concentrate. "Add" means all that character means. No man is born either naturally or supernaturally with character, he has to make character. Nor are we born with habits; we have to form habits on the basis of the new life God has put into us. We are not meant to be illuminated versions, but the common stuff of ordinary life exhibiting the marvel of the grace of God. Drudgery is the touchstone of character. the great hindrance in spiritual life is that we will look for big things to do. "Jesus took a towel...and began to wash the disciples' feet."
There are times when there is no illumination and no thrill, but just the daily round, the common task. Routine is God's way of saving us between our times of inspiration. Do not expect God always to give you His thrilling minutes, but learn to live in the domain of drudgery by the power of God.
It is the "adding" that is difficult. We say we do not expect God to carry us to heaven on flowery beds of ease, and yet we act as if we did! The tiniest detail in which I obey has all the omnipotent power of the grace of God behind it. If I do my duty, not for duty's sake but because I believe God is engineering my circumstances, then at the very point of my obedience the whole superb grace of God is mine through the Atonement.

- Oswald Chambers

Gold for Bread

Thoughts of Thinkers

"A youth is to be regarded with respect. How do we know that his future will not be equal to our present?If he reach the age of forty of fifty, and has not made himself heard of, then indeed he will not be worth being regarded with respect."
- Confucius

"Joy is the ability to treasure Jesus."
-Emily

The Strength of Weakness
"The weakest things in the world can overmatch the strongest things in the world.
Nothing in the world can be compared to water for its weak and yielding nature; yet in attacking the hard and the strong nothing proves better than it. For there is no other alternative to it.
The week can overcome the strong and the yielding can overcome the hard."
-From the Tao-Te King of Taoism

"Tsze-kung asked, saying, 'What do you say of a man who is loved my all the people of his neighbourhood?' The Master replied, 'We may not for that accord our approval of him.' 'And what do you say of him who is hated by all the people of his neighbourhood?' The Master said, 'We may not for that conclude that he is bad. It is better than either of these cases that the good in the neighbourhood love him, and the bad hate him."
-From the Analects of Confucius

"And of this gospel I was appointed a herald and an apostle and a teacher. That is why I am suffering as I am. Yet I am not ashamed, because I know whom I have believed, and am convinced that he is able to guard what I have entrusted to him for that day."
-2 Timothy 1:11-12

"Though I know what to pray for, I do not know how. I want to believe that God is the glory and power and kingdom forever-but doesn't forever mean now too? How can we even make such a claim in the midst of our world? It must be a statement of belief with imaginative power. We must soak up God, experience him, let him guide his own hermeneutic in our lives so that we can start to see the outline of his throne. The more we know him the more we know us. The temptation is to not let the 'us' we see pass by like we should, but to take it as our God and give it the kingdom and the authority and the power. To really believe God means to focus on him throughout the rushing and fading of pain, hurt, brokenness, exhaustion, national catastrophe, lies, perversion, and endless (though ending) sighs, and to take them for what God calls them, occasions for love and justice and heaven to break in. We must let God be God as we venture further in our beliefs of him. Though this kingdom seems to have no king, I am just a poor beggar on a street corner that can not imagine the throne room of the King who is coming to reign. Someone is telling me there is a king coming. With this small hope I will hold on with my whole life until God starts to reveal not only the outline of his throne, but the full goodness of the world where he reigns."
-Emily

Love for God

Common men talk bagfuls of religion but act not a grain of it, while the wise man speaks little, but his whole life is a religion acted out.

If I hold up this cloth before me, you will not see me any more, though I shall be as near you. So also God is nearer to you than anything else, yet because of the screen of egoism you cannot see him.

If you fill an earthen vessel with water and set it apart upon a shelf, the water in it will dry up in a few days; but if you place the same vessel immersed in water, it will remain filled as long as it is kept there. Even so is the case of your love for the Lord God. Fill and enrich your bosom with the love of God for a time and then enjoy yourself in other affairs, forgetting him all the while, and then you are sure to find within a short time what your heart has become poor and vacant and devoid of that precious love. But if you keep your heart immersed always in the ocean of divine love, your heart is sure to remain ever full to overflowing with the water of divine love.

From the woks of Sri Ramakrishna, "Many Paths to the One God" Hindu Scriptures

Growing Old

As I grow old, I ponder life. I now have wrinkles, and I can feel, when the weather is cold enough, that I will one day inherit my mom's arthritis. These signs are not the sad oncoming of ending life that I once thought they would be. All the world screams that to be old is not a life at all, but as I get older, get married, and look to life in the next stage, I realize that the joys are as sweet as childhood. The experiences are different. I no longer can stand on my roller skates and wonder how I will look when I am an adult, but I get to look into the face of a person that loves me like I never thought anyone could. The challenges are different, but just as hard. God is just as near. Growing old is a great time be alive; just as good as growing up. The romantification of youth is overrated, and, I am finding, one of the most wonderfully surprising false messages that we receive.
One of the new challenges that I must face is the tendency of people my age to lock into a set of beliefs. We grow up and as a part of that process experience things and draw conclusions from those experiences. Some of those experiences are good and so we may start to believe good and right things; such as the existence of a good God. However, these believes as locked beliefs are just as dangerous as the opposite beliefs if they are also locked. I had a moment this morning, sitting in my kitchen, where I realized that I could decide to believe something that was not true and live a fine life always believing this. At that moment God came to me and reminded me that he is my Lord. God is Lord of someone when they realize that who they are is not defined by a set of believes that tells something about their experiences, but rather when they recognize that they are someone only in relation to a surprising, dynamic God that we just can't seem to pin down. The comfort of understanding yourself with a set of locked beliefs is great. God, however, calls us to truth. I want to be who I am to God. Since God is not a relation that you can nail down, I am excited about the next phase of our relationship, where I will get to experience him in time and space, and grow to know and love him more as he continues to show me who I am. Thank God for life, and for the gift of growing old.

Admittation

I don't always see who you are becoming
I often interrupt you with who I have composed you to be
I don't see your softness
When you see mine
I miss opportunities to do right; be right; speak right
But you love me
And you help me heal
And you are a gift
God said he is extravagant
I'm pretty sure
God went to all of this so I can really start to know how he loves me
How redonculous he is
He is so extreme
He comes to us in our most intimate needs and desires
And lives here with us
By this we know who he is
And it turn who we are
By his stripes we are healed
I want to see who you are becoming
I don't want to interrupt you anymore
I want to see every contour of your softness
And how you see me
So that I will come to you
Like he came to me through you