How does this happen? You go to sleep in a good mood (granted, it was late) but then wake up in a foul one. So, here I sit on a Saturday morning inexplicably grumpy. I’m tired (which I’m sure doesn’t help), my head is in a fog (which also doesn’t help), but I also just couldn’t care less about much of anything. Very Christian of me.
What’s worse - is sitting here and recognizing that you’re being a grumpy jerk to your own family and overreacting (within my mind - not always overtly) to every little thing that happens. You know you’re overreacting and, in fact, you know you’re being a jerk and a grump… but are seemingly incapable of forcing yourself to change. “Be happy! Be of good cheer!” Whatever.
How desperately we need our Lord in these situations. What a reminder of just how ridiculously selfish I am and that I must cling to my Savior in these moments - especially when I don’t really want to. God’s grace to me is that he allows me to see my sin for what it is - selfish, pigheaded, and just plain mean. These are the moments you start questioning your own salvation until God reminds you of just how much He loves you by telling you just how stupidly you’re acting in the kind and firm way that only He can.
So, here I sit, clinging to God finally - recognizing that He is my help, my salvation, my fortress, my strong tower, and, most importantly, my joy.
Hopefully, you see in these writings a man who is staying The Course and pursuing The Path amidst the pitfalls and selfish ways of being a son of Adam. I pray earnestly that my writing would encourage some of you by showing you that this journey - though arduous and sometimes tragic - is a journey of great satisfaction. A satisfaction greater than our greatest imaginings. The trials and refining fire of tribulation are to be recognized as a small shadow of the suffering of our Savior so that we can rejoice, as Peter and the disciples did, to be counted worthy to suffer for the sake of the Name.