Armor Up!
Last week’s blog post got eaten by the internet. Seriously! I had the post already to go and hit “save draft.” The next thing I saw was a mostly blank page with a notice that my link had expired. (I didn’t know I was using a link that could expire!) And just like that, an hour’s or more work was gone! It’s been a lot like that lately. We are needing to pick up the pace of divesting of much of our 46 years of accumulated stuff. I’m just barely keeping up with my basic responsibilities when another crisis erupts or a phone call comes that leaves me ragged and beaten up, feeling betrayed and baffled, overwhelmed and undersupplied, slimed and stymied. Just when I think I can ride the wave that’s beneath me, another comes and swamps my boat leaving me sputtering and flailing. Wave after wave crashes over me…and not like I expect the love of God to feel. A disheartening discussion of what we needed to do to counter an infestation was followed almost immediately by a phone conversation that left me shaken and spent, like I had just spent two hours beating back the flames of hell with a wet gunny sack. Hopeless and exhausted!
Yesterday’s challenges made it hard to focus on the word this morning, hard to be quiet and wait on the Lord. The promise of “rest for your souls” (in Jeremiah 6: 16) seemed empty. Where are the “old ways” that I can walk in and find this? Then I read that Paul instructs the church in Thessalonika to admonish the idle. (The footnoted translation says the “disorderly and undisciplined.” Guilty as charged!) And then back-tracking a bit into 1 Thessalonians reminded me that those who “belong to the day” need to put on armor…God’s armor. I found myself wondering how long it had been since I had regularly put on the armor of God, a la Ephesians 6. I think it’s been a while. So, before I did anything else, I sat and verbally donned the suit of armor that in the past has been my regular daily wardrobe. Pink-flowered and spangled long shirt covered with the breastplate of righteousness, shoes of the readiness of the gospel like spats over or crampons under my sneakers… You get the idea. Piece by piece I read the passage out loud, mentally donning each piece, giving thanks for the helmet of salvation, healing, wholeness and deliverance, and holding in front of me for protection the shield of faith that has the what-for to put out the flaming arrows launched from hell at my heart.
The result was peace and the ability to stand in the battle that is afoot! It doesn’t get me out of the onslaught, but God has promised that it will enable me to stand firm in this battle that is not human against human, but demonic forces against redeemed child of God. It is never a case of God not giving me more than I can handle; it is a matter of God always providing from His own resources for me in the situations that I cannot resolve. So here I am still…
Following Jesus every day in the everyday,
Christi
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