digging with a spoon

FRIENDS,

this morning i am quiet, pondering. sometimes growth seems so slow and failure feels so damning. i wonder what could possibly be so wrong with me. but the Ancient of Days is the one who created me and chose me for His purpose. so i’m not big enough to mess up what he’s designed. even when i think i am a hopeless case, stubbornly clinging to my own ways, He speaks to me through a psalm:

“therefore we will not fear, though the earth should change
and though the mountains slip into the heart of the sea;
though its waters roar and foam,
though the mountains quake at its swelling pride. selah.

there is a river whose streams make glad the city of God
the holy dwelling places of the Most High.
God is in the midst of her, she will not be moved;
God will help her when morning dawns.” psalm 46.

for so long i’ve groaned inside, waiting for my bad habits and weaknesses to become strengths, looking for insight, like digging a canyon with a spoon…

i’ve been such a child.

the writer of hebrews explains something new: “for though by this time you ought to be teachers, you have need again for someone to teach you the elementary principles of the oracles of God, and you have come to need milk and not solid food. for everyone who partakes only of milk is not accustomed to the word of righteousness, for he is an infant. but solid food is for the mature, who because of practice have their senses trained to discern good and evil.” hebrews 5. it’s time to get up and train. it’s time to start practicing, instead of waiting and groaning.

here is the lesson i’m learning: God gives his gifts to us, and truth, but maturity is not one of those things handed out for free. kind of an unglorious message today. not really bright or sweeping. oh, well. that’s the way it goes sometimes. if ever i will grow up into the character of Christ, it takes days like this… it’s funny, really. i can’t pray my way into growing up.

if, in the ways that you are growing up, you feel like i’ve described, you can know that you’re not alone. i’m the one right there behind you- learning how to walk.