Thursday, June 4, 2009

Restoration

Just read some interesting reflections about being stressed and tired and needing to give time to restoring activities. See http://hippocampusextensions.com/karen/fill_the_well/

The restoring activity I need at the moment is to spend time reading the bible and being challenged to live more saltily. It has become too easy to just drift along and my faith make no difference to how I live. I am busy and I do get tired but I think this saps my strength to the point where I don't even care about the eternal trajectory of the lives around me. Sometimes I struggle to even pray faithfully for my own family.

Putting on a good spiritual face with Christians I have known for a long time is hypocritical and I don't outright bluff and lie. However, I make little additions to the truth of my lasitude, prayerlessness and barrenness, so that they do not see how broken I am and how much I need the mercy of my Father.

I really want the answer to be easy and not to have to change. I want a transformed life with as little effort as possible. I want to be able to carry out all the projects and ideas in my mind, but there just is not time or energy to commit to them all. I need to prioritise and choose but I allow circumstance and laziness to choose for me. It is easier to sit and watch an hour of Brothers and Sisters than to spend an hour praying or talking with my husband in order to encourage him.

I stop to see where I am and how life is progressing. Usually, it is so easy to skim quickly over what I see, so that I do not get too self-critical or discouraged. But sometimes I need to really be honest in my appraisal when I look in the mirror. 

I do believe that there is a time to be gracious to myself and not to be too hard or critical. But if true graciousness is possible, then there is also a time to acknowledge my deep, deep flaws and failures. Not doing it so that someone can hear or see, then reach out and reassure me, but so that I can know how much I need help, how much I need God and his spirit in me.

Only then can I begin to be restored.

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