Happy Thanksgiving, Hearth. I hope you managed to Martha it out.
Have you ever read The Seven Storey Mountain by Thomas Merton? If not, I highly recommend it. I think that given your appreciation of C.S. Lewis, this book would not fail to move you. In the book, towards the end, Merton muses on the irony of having chosen a life of verbal silence, when his nature leaned towards curiosity and self-expression. I seem to recall that he came to the conclusion that he had sacrificed that part of his personality for the sake of Christ who had called him as a monk.
I think he has a point in that it sometimes seems to me that what is the hardest for us to do, in terms of what our nature is - introvert/extrovert - is what we need to force ourselves to do. When we do what is in line with our nature, well, that is the easiest thing.
For me, the hardest thing is to put myself out there. I really would rather just be left alone with a book. So when I force myself to do things I really would rather not do, I try to do it with a cheerful heart, as a sacrifice to God.
I want everything to be perfect when company comes over when really it might be better to let things be imperfect, and just sit and chat a while. Not because I get so much out of it, but because maybe the other person needs someone to listen. And because, when you listen, when you least expect it, you often learn something you didn't know before.
For me the 'cure' or semi-cure for daydreaming is that I make a list of things that I know need doing but which I keep putting off. That usually involves cleaning. Nothing brings you more into the moment than cleaning. And I need to be in the moment more, I need something to tie me to the moment without thinking too much.
I think you hit on the problem many Christians who believe in the eminent approach of the Rapture experience - that of looking so forward to that day, that it takes the place of the work that they have yet to do in the vineyard. Proverbs 13:12 says, Hope deferred maketh the heart sick: but when the desire cometh, it is a tree of life.
In no way do I doubt the return of the Lord Jesus Christ but I think that when people dwell too much on the 'End Times,' they tend to mistake their own visions for visions from God and make themselves too open to error. Why? Because hope deferred maketh the heart sick.
The prophet Jeremiah is very interesting in chapter 23. It is a fairly lengthy chapter on false prophets. I have heard modern day Christian 'prophets' use a phrase something like, "the Lord put a burden on me" or something along those lines - I probably don't have the right church words - to describe what they feel is the Holy Spirit giving them a special message, maybe to pray for a particular purpose, or to pronounce a particular idea. Pat Robertson is one of the more infamous people to do this but everyday Christians do this as well, on a much lesser scale.
Through Jeremiah, God says .... I am against the prophets, saith the LORD, that steal my words every one from his neighbour.
31 Behold, I am against the prophets, saith the LORD, that use their tongues, and say, He saith.
32 Behold, I am against them that prophesy false dreams, saith the LORD, and do tell them, and cause my people to err by their lies, and by their lightness; yet I sent them not, nor commanded them: therefore they shall not profit this people at all, saith the LORD.
33 And when this people, or the prophet, or a priest, shall ask thee, saying, What is the burden of the LORD? thou shalt then say unto them, What burden? I will even forsake you, saith the LORD.
34 And as for the prophet, and the priest, and the people, that shall say, The burden of the LORD, I will even punish that man and his house.
35 Thus shall ye say every one to his neighbour, and every one to his brother, What hath the LORD answered? and, What hath the LORD spoken?
36 And the burden of the LORD shall ye mention no more: for every man's word shall be his burden; for ye have perverted the words of the living God, of the LORD of hosts our God.
I think that there is a balance to be found between waiting on the Lord, as we do, and believing He will return because He said He would and being sleepwalking virgins through life, instead of waiting with lamps lit, and eyes awake. Getting overly caught up in the day and the time and the means in which He will return and who the Antichrist is and who the False Prophet is takes our eyes away from the work that we still have to do until He comes.
And if we are doing His work everyday we are not clock-watching labourers in the field doing a poor job of it - but we are not afraid that He will find us sleeping when He comes and our work undone.
Layla
