Lent: Day 22

Lord, it's really difficult to figure out how I'm supposed to follow You and lead others at the same time. It becomes as if every failure, tiring circumstance, difficulty, or busyness comes from You. It's been interesting. This year as I have taught the Bible, I have become less and less interested in studying it... I know that's not the best for having great Bible lessons. I mean, I still read the Bible every morning, but my passion for connecting the narrative, for applying it to my own life, that has died in some ways.

I could trace that to many things, but I think the biggest reason is my desire to escape "work." Gideon has caused us to be extra tired at times this year, before Christmas when he wasn't sleeping through the night, here after the break where he has gotten sick or gets up incredibly early. Even if it is only once or twice a week, that tiredness adds up fast. Then, of course, I spend a lot of time at work all week. So when I have this time to come into Your presence, I don't want to work, to think, to consider, to reason, and so on and so on.

Then there has been my poetry, which I really enjoy at times. Other times it becomes the same burden as study (like the past two weeks where I've not written anything, basically). But the poetry takes time as well, and is more interesting than just straight up study. So that has taken time from this as well. Of course, I think it has had it's benefits. I like some of the beautiful poems I've written. However, I don't want them if I feel like ultimately they lead me away from You. So, let my poems be a way of praising and wrestling with You. Let them flow beautifully, artfully, but certainly honestly and passionately from me.

So, I was reading Job again this morning. In today's section of Job, he is arguing for a time to argue with You. He is also claiming that You are absent, that is why he can't even begin the discussion. This is one of the reasons I really dig the book of Job, I know that feeling he is writing about. That feeling of not even knowing where to begin. That feeling of distance despite desire. The feeling of not being able to find what you are looking for. I've had them all at some point in the recent past.

The thing about Job, and then the thing about me, is that we really never get answered of how to go about seeking You, how to recognize You, how to speak to You. In the end of Job, You just kind of show up and lay the verbal smack down on everybody. Many times when I feel desperate like Job You just show up, in Scripture, or comfort, or reassurance, or in renewal after my repentance, or lots of other ways and times. The part that I can't get over is that it doesn't seem that my action really dictates Your action all the time. Other than the fact that You are going to answer the cry, You don't really tell us much about the how, the when or the why. Like, I've had times where I have sought You in morning prayer, intensely, for two weeks only for You to show up and speak to me while I'm on a walk through the college campus. Then other times I'll kind of be loose and lazy for a month, have one real time of repentance and there You are, speaking clearly and closely from the Scripture. It never happens the same way.

It's good to know, I guess, that even when we fall into desperate times, we still cannot control You.