Nesting

Many, many times over the course of my life, I have rared back (not sure this is a real term, but it's one we use in the South) and pitched myself headlong into my faith, with the express intention of giving Christ my all. Of selling out to Him lock, stock and barrel. This is a significant step for someone like me, who was ADD before it was cool. I have what I affectionately refer to as "motivational phasing." In short, I go AWOL from certain areas of my life while going OCD bananas in others. I scrap-booked for two or three years in manic fashion, then trailed off to pursue other things. I will steadfastly clean house (for a few minutes) then fall back into domestic lethargy while reading an entire book in days.

It is not as if I have EVER walked away from my faith in Jesus. It's just that following Him requires a single-mindedness of devotion that I have never mastered. At the rate I am going, I am going to be carried across the finish line, bowing low in thanksgiving that Jesus died for my (MANY) habitual sins. I have and do pay the heavy price of broken fellowship with Jesus, a life filled with fears that make daily duties sometimes feel like a walk through a fun-house of mirrors, and a continual sense that I am A) missing the mark, B) unworthy of fellowship with the very people who would help me to grow and C) wandering around in the mist and fog of someone else's destiny, not my own. And at my current weight (35 lbs over what I'd like), I guess I could say it's like a scene from "Gorillas in the Mist."

After reading a beautiful book by one of my favorite Christian writers, I started to make some meaningful changes in my spiritual life a few weeks ago. I was sleeping at night for the first time in recent memory. Satan immediately attacked, leaving my little fortress in tatters. He brought irresistible distractions, in the form of struggles involving my children and conflicts with other family members. He has studied me for a very long time. He knows what flings me into the wind. I suppose, instead of concentrating on my weaknesses and failures, I should get back up. Just get back up, take the Lord's hand, and move on. After all, following the Lord is NOT about me. It's about Jesus. If my life reflects Christ, it is CERTAINLY not to my credit. His overwhelming grace and mercy and the power of His Holy Spirit bring about any and all good in me and in my actions. He is the center, and I need to make my nest in Him.