He restores my soul...

This is an email that I wrote to my best friend yesterday morning sometime between 6 and 8 AM:

I woke up this morning at something like 4, to get up and pee - yay for being pregnant - and couldn't go back to sleep because I was growlingly hungry. So I got up at five to have some raisins and a glass of milk, and went to the psalms.

It's the 4th, so I went to Ps 20-24. If you break down the Psalms into 30, and read 5 a day, you can go through them once every month - you find the ones to read by multiplying 5 times the day's date, and that's the one you start on. I never read them every day anymore because I am a terrible person, but that's the theory anyway. You can do the same with Prov, but it's a lot easier since there are only 31 of them. No math.

I'm sitting on a chair in the living room with the computer on my lap. The irony of having a computer on your lap is that suddenly the cat thinks you're doing something really interesting and decides it's important to get on your lap, too. Leo (the orange and white one) is all about my lap right now, but he's purring and kneading and loving on me, so how can I push him off? Besides, he's the one who can't focus for more than 3 seconds, so if he lies down, he'll leave in a minute anyway.

So back to what I was saying... I couldn't get past 23:3 for a while: "he restores my soul."

That's what I need. My soul needs restoring. When I'm sick and weary and feeling puny even when I am hardly doing anything, it's hard to feel a capacity to move beyond just getting up and not barfing. I think of the pyramid of needs that you learn about in health or human development or whatever - that the most basic needs are related to the physical, before anyone can be responsive to the higher eschelon of needs, like psychological or spiritual. I know I don't compare to a starving, war-torn refugee or anything, but it's still what I thought of. I am not necessarily in a place where I am at my healthiest. And I am not saying it's because I feel crummy, but feeling so crummy doesn't really help me be excited about much of anything, even if I know in my heart that I will benefit from feeding my spirit, not just my upset stomach.

Speaking of which, I am going to have to start over again with the snacks... but I have a banana, so hopefully that'll stick. Yeah, so that was fun.

Lately I have been a total slacker in every way. You would think that now that I'm not working, and have all the time in the world, and have an answered prayer growing in my abdomen, that I would find every excuse to be in the Word and be ecstatic! And I think I was for a few days. But then nausea and boredom and exhaustion set in, and I have struggled. Part of that is due to feeling yucky, so I am not engaging anyone in fellowship. When I'm not doing that, my heart's not going to be very healthy.

Another part of it is the realization that I am receiving the desires of my heart, and they are not enough. A husband is a wonderful thing, but I can't put all my life into him alone; a house that's our very own is great, but it's certainly not enough to occupy me; the promise of a baby is exciting and hopeful, but not enough at all to fulfill my life. Only fellowship with Jesus is enough. Then I can enjoy what he's given me. And if I can't fellowship with him now, while I'm pretty much my only distraction, there isn't any hope for me when I have a fussy child to tend to.

He restores my soul.

He does it - I don't have to restore my soul myself. Thank God. If it were up to me to figure out how to restore myself, I had better just curl up and pull the covers over my head for the next 50 years. All my attempts come up empty. All he expects is for me to humbly let him work in me. I am grateful that he does not require much. "my yoke is easy and my burden is light". Thank God! I can do light, but I can't fathom more. Not right now. The wonderful thing is that He doesn't require more than we can give. He requires exactly what we have to give, but no more. He knows my frame. He remembers that I am like dust, like grass, like a flower that fades... He knows how he's made me, and He knows what I can give. I don't know what I can give, but I have my ideas. My ideas are always less than what He knows, but what He asks is not too much. He is worth what I can give him. And the exchange is worth the surrender of what I have for what He has. It always has been.

I am very grateful that He is working in my heart to revive and restore me. He has been speaking to me lately, with words of encouragement, which I have kept in my heart off and on.

On Sunday Brother John spoke about worship. He said that "true worship is walking in revealed truth." That is probably the one thing that I remember from what he said all day, but it was the seed I will carry for a while. I spent some time over the last few days remembering things that the Spirit has spoken to my heart, that I need to walk in...

"what does it matter to you what happens to him? You must follow me."

"my darling... let me see your face, let me hear your voice."

"today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts."

"be transformed by the renewing of your mind"

"whatever is not done in faith is sin"

"we love because he first loved us"

There are so many... Those are only the ones that came while I thought about it over the last day or two. The reality is that everything I have ever had deposited in me, I have the potential to walk out. How? I don't really know, but I know it has to do with faith, and with deciding beforehand to choose what is true rather than what is based on any deception I have talked myself into.

I am starting to feel a bit more like myself now that it's almost 8 AM. I might take a little snooze for a while to see if I can rest a little, but I might put that off till this afternoon, when I'll really need it.

I'm pretty excited that I'm having a handful of girls over on Monday to make cookies. I am also very pleased that I've done most of the cleaning already, and only have to clear off some counter space, file away the papers on the table, and make sure I have what I need in the pantry. And give stinky dog a bath. The bath is a pretty involved process for a large, geriatric dog, since Sam has to hoist her into the bathroom, and carry her into the tub, since she refuses to come within 18" of the bathroom door - she's no idiot; she knows what goes on in there. Then he has to lift her back out of the tub, a wet, squirming thing, with long nails, flailing in every direction. Other than that, it's fine. It's like preparation for having a six-yr-old child.

I think I have lost my attention span. I have 3 other windows open now, so I think I'm done writing.