i am constantly telling people that if God is truly their friend then they should be spending quality time with the Big Guy. And, for added guilt, i add in that when we have a live-living-touchable friend we make the time to spend with them, so why don't we do the same for God.
so yesterday i found myself spending the day at home. as i took my position on the couch, i realized that i really need to be practicing what i was talking about. i went to the bookshelf in my living room for a bible, because i do own several, and there was not one on the shelf. i then went into the spare room and searched those bookshelves and alas, there were no bibles to be found. when i moved i did give a large stack of paperback bibles that i had collected over the years to a friend who lives in midtown sacramento with the promise that she will give them to people in midtown that need them (some homeless, some homed). so i realized that i was without a bible.
frustrated that all of me bibles were in my office, and not wanting to make the journey down there, i then sat down with a journal and began writing to God. i began doing this pretty regularly about ten years ago after my dad died, but then have stopped and started again over the years. because one of my great creative outlets is writing (photography and cooking are the others) i find calm and relax when i apply pen to paper. (now that the computer is gone, my tendinitis in my thumb has come back and is quite painful... i need a computer!)
this practice allows me to stop and think about what i am putting down. i actually slow myself down enough to think through my thoughts, to make sense of what is floating around in my head. i feel that i am able to get everything out for that moment in a timely manner that i then feel satisfied at the end.
all in all i was reminded why we need to spend time with God. we live in a world that is constantly moving, a world that doesn't stop to take a breath. the more people i know who have retired in the last five years are busier than when they were working. we move and move and move, until we are forced to stop, usually for health reasons. i don't want to be like that. i don't want to categorize God or my relationship with Him by how much time i have to squeeze Him in during the week or on Sunday morning. i truly never understood the people who complained about the church morning when the last service wouldn't get out until noon or 12:30 p.m., epically when they would say that half their day is gone and they can't do anything productive. isn't sunday that day of the sabbath, where we aren't supposed to work? isn't that a day that is supposed to be completely committed to God?
i think we need to do several things. first we need to slow down. second we need to remember to breath. third we need to allow God to be more in our lives. and finally we need to look at the beauty of what God has created around us.
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