incarnation

been feeling lost and condemned in my days.  want to read and do internets 24/7.  not sure how much housework i'm supposed to be doing, how much i'm supposed to play with freddy, or even what my <3 should be towards him (if only i had a new affection!!  that would solve all my problems!!).

jared suggested we watch a jesus movie this holy week.  jared is great.  so we watched the gospel of john.  thinking about jesus putting up with the precious disciples ("is he mad about the bread?!") gave me a lightbulb moment.

to me come the privilege and duty of INCARNATION as an 11 month old.  i get to sit w/ freddy on the floor and sometimes be bored, i get to take him outside to look at birds and sometimes be bored, i get to try to trick him into eating, i get to rock him to sleep and sometimes fall asleep, i get to read hop on pop a lady-gaga-zillion times and never get bored.  he is my little congregation.  i think this is christlike.

and now somehow this principle has set me free.  i don't feel lost.  limiting my internets is not the point.  incarnation is the point.  jesus' grand, glorious incarnation and now my mini-magical one.

i have felt guilty b/c i have borrowed trouble from tomorrow when we hopefully have a buttload of kids.  but if i have a lazy-daisy life right now why should i feel guilty about that?  and it's true, in the future i will probably need to follow a housekeeping routine or we all will die but who cares about that now (as long as jared has clean underwear in his drawer)?  and in the future, my leisure time will probably dwindle away to nothing but who cares about that now!!  when i have no time for escape i will deal with that then.  why did my summer of no expectations have to end when summer ended?

the new jesse:  my calling is incarnation w/ Freddy.  i can read blogs as much as i want as long as jared has clean underwear in his drawer.


my new grasp of Jesus' incarnation: when He was with the Father, He could read blogs all day long.  but He came down to earth at a time when the internet hadn't even been invented yet!!!!  

i'm not joking.  the thought causes me to praise Him.

hunger games/ holy week fast

jared and i are doing a terrible fast.  they told us to fast from the pulpit at our new church!  zing!  it's a global hunger fast and we are basically eating plain oatmeal for breakfast, and rice and beans for lunch and dinner.  i also eat a hardboiled egg and a million clementines for the sake of my milk and because i need snacks to live.  we are not giving up coffee.
i was aghast the first day.  i couldn't stand it.  i just gasped out the word "treats" over and over.
my intention was to make room for jesus to draw near emotionally to me in my misery...  i don't think i made room.  instead i learned that i stuff my spirit's face w/ a) internet, b) food, and if i can't have internet or food, c) shopping.
so what now?  i can fast all i want but i need the expulsive power of a greater affection (READ THIS ARTICLE) or i will remain excruciatingly ravenous.
how can i get a new affection for Him?  i can only ask.

/

jared and i saw the hunger games this week (and broke our fast to have treats; they did not satisfy!!).  must confess i haven't read the books yet, but enjoyed the movie very much.  we both thought the way the games ended was a little cheesy, but what ending wouldn't have been cheesy?  it would have had to be a stroke of amazing genius to think of a way.

all through the movie i was marveling at the author's skill in helping us suspend our disbelief and enter into this world that seems outrageous.  i mean, i'm all about depravity, i know humanity is capable of terrible things, but we were able to enter in w/ no glitch.  is it because in that early scene, gale and katniss can't believe this is happening either?  i don't know.

i asked jared what he thought, expecting him to maybe not like it because it was so... young adult.  he said, "it had 2 things i really don't like in it.  1) i can't watch this kind of thing the same way anymore because of freddy.  2) i felt like we as the audience watching the hunger games are no better than those future people in the audience watching the hunger games."

wow.  i personally had forgotten about our child except to sometimes enjoy the loud audio w/o worrying it would wake him.  and i forgot to morally evaluate a thing.  it's fun to be married to jared.  he is very thoughtful.

click through for a SPOILER ALERT that spoiled the movie a little for me (although it's not the climax):

ash2easter

oops.  right after i launched this series, i realized i'm not actually that into Lent this year.

i'm on a barely perceptible upswing, able to praise and thank for the first time in quite some time, so i just don't want to LAMENT.

lament?  no thank you, when i can finally offer some feeble praise.

is that wrong?  that might be wrong.

but i think there are other aspects to lent that i can lean into.  i do want to make space for Him.  i do want to show Him honor.

joel 2 talks about the congregation.

consecrate the congregation.
gather the children,
even infants at the breast.

somehow to me that has come to mean my little family.  i know it's more than that and i shouldn't suppress the outward call, but this is my starting place, where it is sweet.

i'm always telling myself, won't it be fun when freddy is older and you can sing spiritual songs + hymns together, you can read the Bible and Jesus Calling For Kids together?  but i must consecrate the congregation NOW.  even infants at the breast.