One Thing On My To-Do List

I've been struggling with my own inadequacy lately - this is a perpetual problem for me, but it's been especially bad lately. My house is not clean enough. My kids are not progressing in school fast enough and they miss behave (which is clearly a reflection on my parenting). My laundry is not done promptly enough. My waist is not thin enough. And the list goes on, and on. Bottom line: I've been discouraged.

So this morning I got up to find a message from God in my inbox. Really. Well he used a couple of his people in the delivery, but it was pretty clear. Hubby forwarded me a devotional about the feelings of fear, guilt, and frustration parents face. The devotional concluded with Proverbs 14:2 "In the fear of the Lord there is strong confidence, and His children will have refuge. " Hmm...guess its not about me after all. Its about placing my confidence in Him.

Then my dear friend Paula wrote an email about what she'd been learning lately. Here are some snippets:

"It's my job to respond to Him, not to fix myself. Fix your eyes on Him. Set your thoughts, heart and actions on those of the Father. He doesn't want you to dig around in your life and pull out all the junk you find. He will change you as He adjusts your sight and sensitizes your ears to His voice. All you need to do today is seek Him....Believe His power provides everything you need for life and godliness."

Paula wrote that is was nice to only have one thing on her to-do list today - Respond to Jesus. That goes double for me.

Here is the really cool thing: I've been reading in Matthew, and been noticing that angels show up left and right to deliver messages. People have dreams, God speaks, the Holy Spirit prompts. Jesus talks directly to Satan. The line between what goes on in the spiritual realm and what goes on in the physical is non-existent. I've been thinking, "since when did God stop speaking, and communicating directly with His people." He hasn't changed, and I know in other parts of the world he is still doing miracles of the New Testament variety. How did my faith become so sterile and academic. So I prayed for a new kind of faith, well actually the old kind: the kind where God speaks, and I listen, and then I talk and He hears and responds. A relationship. Guess what? God showed up in my inbox. He started the conversation and he said, in plain old English, "You worry about too many things, but only one thing is needed. Come sit at my feet, come be with me. I am worthy of your confidence, and I love you. "