Blogging Is My Spiritual Direction This Evening

Golly, I'm feeling punchy tonight. What exactly do I mean by that? I have this itching desire to stand on a soap box and preach about me knowing so much good stuff about life. And how you're gonna see, some day, that I'm right and you are standing on the brink of danger sucking up this American culture indiscriminately and it is rotting your brain.

Being full of oneself is never a good sign, is it?

Imagine Jesus feeling this way. It almost makes me laugh. Here is the Son of God, wiser than even His Mother (whom no one thought particularly wise, anyway, I'm sure). He could have lined up the best of the intellectuals of his day and whooped them like they'd never forget. He could have shot off about how He knew better than anyone. He could have told everyone exactly what was wrong with them, and what it would take to fix it. He could have astounded everyone with secrets; things humans had no concept of in those days or in this.

But He didn't, did He.

Oh, He did have some piercing insights when He taught publicly and got in the face of the Pharisees. He did not mince words with hypocrites. But what about all the years when He wasn't doing that. He was humble. He was probably silent in the face of more BS than I could ever imagine. He loved. He interceded. He did what He could to help these people in their daily lives. I'm sure it was the power of all that humility that gave His words tremendous, transformative power when He did speak in His public ministry. I'm sure He didn't even have to speak; one could just feel the power standing in His presence.

How did those Pharisees manage to withstand the power, I wonder? There will always be those who do. An amazing thing, the human soul.

So, I'm itching to lecture; Jesus emptied Himself.

I'm supposed to empty myself.

But Lord, what about those poor people? You know, the ones who will never be perfect parents unless they imitate me? Uh, no, hold it, don't go ask my son what he thinks about that.

The burning need in me to tell people obviously needs to be refined. Golly, it is so hard for me to watch people make choices that may not even be morally bad, just not as good as I think they could be. Let alone to see those immoral choices being made. It makes me feel like a completely powerless dot. I don't want other people sucking away my power.

What is my power? There's "me". Ok, yeah, pretty finite. Not a whole lot there. Then there's Jesus, there's the Holy Spirit, who wants to be that fire in me, that power. But to if I claim to live in Jesus, I have to do what He does:

We know that we have come to know him if we obey his commands. The
man who says, "I know him," but does not do what he commands is a liar, and the
truth is not in him. But if anyone obeys his word, God's love is truly made
complete in him. This is how we know we are in him: Whoever claims to live
in him must walk as Jesus did. 1 John 2:3-6

Aww, man, am I back at that old thing about actually DOING what God wants of me again?

Yep.

Stow away the soap box. Erase the draft blogs and emails. Back off away from the conversations and the people I'm not going to "save" tonight. Give them back to God Whose they are, anyway. Get back to the place God has for me.

Offer it up for the salvation of souls.

Including my own.