Archive for February 25th, 2008
Stale, in need of refreshing
While prayerfully pondering the topic of struggling (Jon’s suggestion for this week’s posts), the word “staleness” comes to mind…in several contexts. On Friday night, chilled and tired from a long day, a long week, I struggle to write something coherent about Struggling. Here’s part of it:
I am forced to admit that the toughest thing I’m up against in my life as a Christ follower…is me. When the still small voice of God feels muffled and far away, I know what the issue is: I’ve stuck the cotton wool of my own monologuing in my ears. When His living Word reads like stale bread, I know it’s that my appetite’s been dulled by overindulgence in other food, other books and diversions. When I lose another battle to the same old sin again, it’s plainly due to armor which is full of chinks or out of place entirely.
Saturday morning, rested and alert, I look at the book in my hand and see it as a gift direct from God. To explain:
On Tuesday this week I saw several large stacks of books (sight to make me salivate like Pavlov’s pups) on the work counter at church. One title leaped out at me: Study Guide for Celebration of Discipline by Richard Foster. I rank Celebration… as a favorite, though it’s been a few years since I’ve read much of it. “Ooh, I’d like to borrow this! I wonder whose these are?” I thought. Later, the books had been moved elsewhere. Sigh. Then on Thursday night in our chapel, while attending a prayer meeting for moms of prodigals (I have two—another struggle), I automatically looked at the room’s bookshelf…and there was another copy of the Study Guide. Without hesitation it went into my purse.
At home I pull Celebration of Discipline off my shelf and note that I first read this book in November of 1995. ‘A few years’ indeed! I am vaguely embarrassed. What does it say of me that an allegedly “life-changing” book has had so little apparent effect?
Foster speaks of spiritual growth as a path, and my heart recognizes a metaphor I’ve been using this season. “We must always remember that the path does not produce the change; it only places us where the change can occur. This is the path of disciplined grace.”
The path does not produce the change. Foster illustrates this with another word picture. The farmer, he says, “is helpless to grow grain…all he can do is provide the right conditions for the growing…” After tilling the soil, planting the seed, watering, feeding and weeding, he has no control over the germination, rooting and growth of the mature plant. This, he writes, “is the way it is with the Spiritual Disciplines—they are…God’s way of getting us into the ground; they put us where he can work within us and transform us. ” (“So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God, who makes things grow.” I Cor. 3:7)
If the obstacle is ME, the obvious way to navigate it is HIM. When I recognize my struggle, He is faithful to remind me that the work is HIS, not MINE. I’ve been breathing stale air and tripping over my own feet because my head is down, my gaze is inward. In fact I’ve wandered into a bog where it’s hard to walk and the air is rank. Back on the path again, head up and eyes on the Son, I’ll let Him guide my feet. Deep breath. The air is freshening already.
