Monday, February 20, 2006
What next?
Yesterday I finished 3-weeks of filling in at Cross of Glory Lutheran Church in Mounds View. I miss preaching on a regular basis and am looking forward to my next opportunity. However, I have to keep in mind that it is not what I want to do, but what God would have me do, that should control my plans.
As part of my devotional reading, I've been using A Year with C.S. Lewis, a gift from my daughter. Lewis reminds me:
For it is not so much of our time and so much of our attention that God demands; it is not even all our time and all our attention; it is ourselves. . . . Let us make up our minds to it; there will be nothing "of our own" left over to live on, no "ordinary" life. I do not mean that each of us will necessarily be called to be a martyr or even an ascetic. That's as may be. For some (nobody knows which) the Christian life will include much leisure, many occupations we naturally like. But these will be received from God's hands. . . . For He claims all, because He is love and must bless. He cannot bless us unless He has us. When we try to keep within us an area that is our own, we try to keep an area of death. Therefore, in love, He claims all. There's no bargaining with him.
-- from A Slip of the Tongue
As part of my devotional reading, I've been using A Year with C.S. Lewis, a gift from my daughter. Lewis reminds me:
For it is not so much of our time and so much of our attention that God demands; it is not even all our time and all our attention; it is ourselves. . . . Let us make up our minds to it; there will be nothing "of our own" left over to live on, no "ordinary" life. I do not mean that each of us will necessarily be called to be a martyr or even an ascetic. That's as may be. For some (nobody knows which) the Christian life will include much leisure, many occupations we naturally like. But these will be received from God's hands. . . . For He claims all, because He is love and must bless. He cannot bless us unless He has us. When we try to keep within us an area that is our own, we try to keep an area of death. Therefore, in love, He claims all. There's no bargaining with him.
-- from A Slip of the Tongue
