Breakfast Is Important, Too

   "Reluctant obedience or sheer willpower will never last the distance. Only the joyful heart can walk the long and difficult road."

   The above is a quote from a little book Dare to Journey with Henri Nouwen, a book of sort devotions by Charles Ringma, featuring the thoughts of Catholic theologian and author Henri Nouwen.

   This morning I read Reflection 45 in this devotion book, so that means that I have been mulling over those words above for the past 15 days or so, and every time that quote comes to mind, I see myself pictured very vividly.

   I often quote the "prayer that never fails" from Jan Karon's Mitford Series, "Thy Will Be Done" and I do believe that these are correct words to pray, but they are not to be reluctant words, but an affirmation. It is not resignation and a shrug of the shoulders that needs to reflect the attitude of the prayer, it is a genuine concern for the "right and proper way".

   When new circumstances come, especially when these are "hard ones", it is not easy to have that joyful heart, but maybe this morning I have had a glimpse of what that looks like.

   The other morning, when both of us woke up early, you know, "nature calls", and I decided to get us both over to the beach area to see the sunrise, I thought it was just so I could get some good pictures, but as I found out much later, even this morning, that it was not me that mattered, it was the making of someone else's heart joyful that caused mine to be that way, too.

   As we sat on the porch just a few minutes ago, several days past the sunrise experience, she told me, "you know, as I woke up this morning, I remembered that sunrise and how glad I was that you took me over there to the beach to see it."

   And I was glad that I had listened to that inner voice that said, "you need to take your wife to the beach right now".

   By making her the center of the whole experience, a joyful heart was had by both.

   God first, Others second, me third.

   That is also why the Thy Will Be Done works...

   That is not reluctant obedience, or even sheer willpower, it is as Nouwen also says:

   "hearing the call, counting the cost, making the commitment and embracing the new direction or circumstance"

   And all I have to do is keep remembering the admonition..

   And for that I need eternal guidance and help.

   And, as I have reflected on all this, and even written it down, I hear a small quiet voice from the back porch, a voice that reminds me that all this introspection is good, but action is even better.

   Time to get breakfast...