Simplify and distractions. . .

Ups and downs. . . every feel like you are the roller coaster car, carrying the masses of joyriders. The number of people that fill the cars affects the ride. There are days when i really wonder what normal, or perhaps stable is a better word feels like.
The benefit of all of the chaos is that the bad is balanced by the good.

In spite of my weakness, good things can happen, even if those good things are little they are still good. The church met at our house this weekend. i really haven't felt all that inspired to teach, in fact i don't believe that i do teach. i lack the focus to sit down and really study a topic from its many angles to put a lesson together, and the wisdom and education to teach my elders. Fact of the matter is i am not sure that my attitude has been in the right spot. There are days when i have emotionally, or through human logic resigned myself to the idea that i deserve hell, and that it is my destiny. Tell me that's not a shallow understanding of grace!

A week ago the men got together and one of our number shared that he felt that our time together had become too lackadaisical. That we were lacking in a sincere sense of reverence for God. By and large i agreed with him at the time, but the response was to become more "structured" more "scheduled". This bucks at everything that i know and love. What stings all the more is knowing that (and i can say this in love) some of my friends are time Nazis. i have always drawn from the wisdom of the movie "Thunderheart". In it one of the older, wiser characters says, "White man's time will give you stomach cancer".
More to my thinking though is how can we schedule our feelings? It is one thing to set aside a time for something occasionally, but how can you say, "i will really feel like singing worship to God at this same time every week" or, "i will really be in a place where i can humbly and without distraction talk to God every week at this time"?
i guess perhaps you can. As i said before, you can at least set the time aside, but to go into something like prayer with the wrong attitude, or distracted, or to sing songs of thankfulness to God while harboring an angry heart . . . is that worth it? Is it even sincere? To me it cheapens the whole experience. It's like saying, "Here is my half hearted effort God. It's really all your worth."

So how does last weeks rant, tie into this weeks events. . .
Let's just say that i went home, um, flustered. The conversation that morning and the responses to it and the way it governed the morning hampered my mood. i don't think that i could tell you what we talked about after that, and i really felt like i had to flee the area so as not to hamper the moods of others. During the following week though some of us talked about it, and i stewed on it. It lead me to the conclusion that perhaps some structure is a good thing. As i said, i agreed with my friend. Then came this last Sunday morning. We were few. Many were away or sick, which was fine. When it came to the "lesson", which in my house is little more than the "conversation" as i am trying to learn more than teach. i made a few errors in translation, and a few presumptions (that while i was certain they were correct, i was not prepared to back up my arguments) that showed my true weakness in this area. We did however stick pretty close to "the schedule". But it was all in the hindsight that i made some observations about my own ability to apply myself during the week to pull a study together, and how much more i need to read, and pray and be solid. All of this realization happening in a good way. . .

And so another week begins. Today is my wife's birthday. . .if it wasn't three in the morning i would call her to wish her a happy birthday!