Blasting Through the Writing Barriers
Today, I'm going to write.
It's 7:55 a.m., it's a late start day with the kids still in bed. They don't have to be at school until 10:00. I woke up about an hour ago, and have been mouthing off to God for most of the time since. I say mouthing off--I mean complaining. Maybe He heard me, maybe He didn't (I think He did), but either way, I feel better. There seems to be a clarity in this moment, a lifting of the fog, and I am determined to get out some things onto the page or the screen that I'm thinking and working on down in my innards.
Who knows, maybe 5000 words today.
I also have to pay bills, ferry the kids around, communicate with a zillion people about the various projects in my life, hopefully get a few moments with Anjie at some point along the way, and as I go, use certain amounts of leftover energy and attention to make sure I don't eat everything in sight, including the massive amounts of leftover lasagne from Sunday's life group.
But see, it's not all the busyness I complain to God about. I've been busy since the day I was born, it seems. The primary thing is that I used to not realize how corrupt the human heart can be on a simple, personal, everyday level. The lofty mountains of living God's love used to be out of sight, out of mind. But ever since I woke up to the fact that the love of God was a reality, needing to be poured out on the world through His people (that would include me), my lack of doing exactlly that (living out that love) is a pebble (more like a boulder) in my shoe. Being prone to self-absorption and navel-gazing anyway, there are stretches of time when I can see nothing but my inability to live the kind of life Jesus lived, and Paul's Romans 7 lament rolls over me with real force: "Who will deliver me from this body of death?" Of course, we know Paul's thrilling answer, but sometimes when I ask the question, there seems to be a huge pause.
All that said, today I'm writing, going on with it. Breaking the silence, hoping to draw someone into a conversation about something that will change the face of the day for someone close to me.
...God bless your thinking and feeling today....
8:12:30 AM
