Provoking e-mail

Recently a friend of mine sent me a devotion from Alicia Britt Cole's newest devotional, Intimate Conversations titled "wiggle worms". It was delightful and thought provoking to read. I replied with many thoughts began pouring from my brain through my fingers. I share this thinking that others are in the same boat of thought as we:

The devotion made me think of my favorite verse: Zephaniah 3:17 “The LORD your God is with you, He is mighty to save. He will take great delight in you, He will quiet you with His love, He will rejoice over you with singing." He will quiet us, whether we want Him to or not. Coming to kiss the feet of Mercy, I lay every burden down at the foot of the cross. We don’t have to go great lengths to find Him, He is right there; in the sunlight spilling over the horizon, the laughter of a tickled child, in the tears of someone who has felt the loss of a loved one, in the sighs of the downtrodden, HE IS THERE. Don’t worry about getting to Him, just go.
 

I definitely agree with “going slower to get deeper”. How many of our greatest relationships have happened in an hour, a day, a week? My count is still at zero for that timeline. Life is filled with interruptions, daily necessities and requirements and obligations that take our attention to something else. If my days are consumed with so many different interruptions how am I ever going to be able to go deeper in, well, anything? But we love that instant gratification so much it’s hard to not keep doing more and more because we get that feel good/done good euphoria when we do. We like drive through because we feed the hunger right away. We like internet because it tells us everything – where to go, how to get there, how much it will cost, how Aunt Fran is doing, what the lyrics are to Chantilly Lace, and so on. We speed, text, e-mail, take digital photographs, seemingly in a constant state of fast forward! 

How many people plant a tomato plant versus going to the store to buy some from Tempe, AZ? We don’t want to wait for the fruits of our labor we’d rather pick up a container of fruit salad. So that’s my “permission” to you to let go of things, savor the growth time and process from dormancy through growth to maturity.

As for "churchy" things, "churchiness" to me is often a synonym for busyness! I know that if God has something I need to know I’m pretty sure that doing more or less "churchy" things will not help nor hinder His objectives. It’s IS hard to say no to the good things: MOPS, music/worship, Sunday school, AWANA’s, dinner groups, homecare groups, womens events, youth group, and many many more. All of these have great things to offer to help MY spiritual goals/walk, but there is too much of a good thing. Let me interject here that God doesn't need any teachers aids but my human brain does. I have to be careful that I don’t let others “expectations” supersede those that God has for me.
 
I feel crazy and disheveled most of the time. Spastically making it from one thing to the next but I'm working on paring down my obligations and know that God is there, waiting with open arms for me to rest awhile.