Originally written 5/19/1997
Frederich
Buechner in, Now and Then, says
“listen to your life.” Three days ago, this reading caught my heart. It did
again this morning.
My life has
good times: it has trying times. The good times are when I am in God’s house
physically or in God’s house spiritually. By physically, I mean in physical
attendance. I don’t like to miss. By spiritually, I mean when I am in tune with
God, connected through devotional readings and those personal worship times.
The trying
times are when I have to deal with those who seem at odds with all things they
can’t control. They seem to think they are right no matter how much other
circumstances point out they are not.
The best
time for me is when I feel God’s presence in my surroundings. The most trying
time for me is when I hear words, phrases, and tones of voice that I perceive
as hurtful and have the ability to sting my soul.
My problem
is that I have not learned how not to react to the hurtful words. I do
desire to get beyond this stage of my problem.
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Update: I still don’t like to miss
worshiping with my brothers and sisters in Christ. Even after 16 years, I
sometimes struggle with knowing how to react to hurtful words. I am still
learning how to deal with these issues; I believe I will always be in His
classroom. This very week, I was able to be with brothers and sisters in Christ
for times of worship and prayer through the week.
Had I
written this today, I would cut out the wordiness.
Linking up to : beneaththesurface-dawn.blogspot.coml