Day 238 – Week 34 at a glance
Scripture focus: It is obvious what kind of life develops out of trying to get your own way all the time: repetitive, loveless, cheap sex; a stinking accumulation of mental and emotional garbage; frenzied and joyless grabs for happiness; trinket gods; magic-show religion; paranoid loneliness; cutthroat competition; all-consuming-yet-never-satisfied wants; a brutal temper; an impotence to love or be loved… Galatians 5:19-20 the Message
A long time ago I passionately pursued tennis. I bought the outfits and joined a team. I signed up for group tennis lessons at my community association. Eventually I took a few lessons from a tennis pro. All this effort – and I still can’t beat my husband at this game!
The tennis pro discovered a weakness in my game that surprised me. I wanted him to improve my serve and backhand. Instead, he told me I had a bigger problem than my ground strokes. He observed that I seemed to care more about running around my problems with my game (and there were many) than I was interested in walking through the pain of change. I wanted to pound the ball; he wanted to teach me how to get the thing over the net. I realized that I had found the perfect coach for me. He was right. I didn’t want to stand at the baseline for hours while he taught me the perfect place to hit the ball with my racket. I didn’t want to work on agility and speed drills. I didn’t want to commit to hitting two hundred serves a day. If he could give me game in a few weeks, great. If not, I didn’t want it bad enough to keep investing all this time and energy (and money). Soon, I was able to let go of my passionate pursuit of tennis. Instead, I play for fun. This was the right decision for me.
This week we’ve continued to explore the characteristics of a life driven by the need to get one’s own way all the time. This isn’t necessarily an uplifting topic. But I’m pressing on! Why? Because I’ve learned that walking through the pain of change in the way I live and love is worth the time and energy. I do need to identify the problem areas of my life before I can effectively seek a solution.
I have enough of a tennis game to give my boys a run for their money on the tennis court – and that’s good enough for me. But I am not satisfied with any obvious weakness in my love life. So if Paul’s list of signs and symptoms of lousy loving happen to hit a nerve in me, then I’m all over it. It’s not pleasant to think about, but it’s productive. Next week we’ll continue looking into this list – because our lives are worth the effort!
Recommended reading: Job 16 and 17 in the morning;: Job 18 and 1 Corinthians 16 in the evening
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