I spent much of the day recouping sleep and rest from the weekend so there wasn’t a huge window of opportunity to put myself out there as God’s disciple, however, I did serve my friend some lunch and we watched a movie as a belated birthday gift. 🙂
Oh, I will say that I also kept my cool in dealing with my tweenage son who is hypersensitive when I don’t ‘get’ something he is trying to say right away. Somehow, coming off of a weekend with the Holy Spirit gives you this super power to be more ‘chill’ and eventually we got around to communicating on the same page.
The lesson that has remained with me, however, comes from the nifty little red book that apparently some of you are looking to find. The lesson is simple but it is what I keep coming back to every time my mind remains idle. Here is the first sentence for the day: “My child, if you will only leave others alone, they will usually leave you alone.” It’s not an earth shattering revelation but in its simplicity there is a key to what I miss about youth ministry. When I was a youth minister I didn’t have time for friends ‘my age’ and the only people’s business I was getting into were the teens lives and most of the time that was because I needed to and it benefited them.
Now that I’ve entered back into this ‘adult’ world again and actually have some time (I say this lightly) for friends and other people ‘my age’ I see how easy it is to get involved in other people’s issues, which isn’t much different than working with teens except the teens came straight to you about their issues, adults are so secretive and you hear about issues from other people.
It makes me shiver. I hate being talked about. I’m not saying that I am either, that is not what this blog is about. (Kind of a catch 22 isn’t it? Blogging about my life but not wanting to be talked about…obviously I don’t mind talking about things that I have shared, it’s when people choose to make assumptions on other’s affairs that they are not truly privy to.) But just the fact that I can’t stand to be talked about I think is why this simple lesson in the book has affected me. My Daily Bread goes on to say, “What does it matter to you what others are doing, unless it is your duty to know?” It goes on to give a lesson about paying attention only to pleasing God and that in the end it is our actions that we have to stand up for on judgment day.
On another note, please pray for Joseph Stanton as he is not doing so well today. His blood pressure is giving him all kinds of fits and they are having to intervene with medications that they didn’t want to have to use. This is an instance of talking about someone else’s affairs that does affect us unless it is our duty..their life affects us because they are pleading for our prayers.
Blessings to you all!
Shannon