“1 The LORD had said to Abram, “Leave your country, your people and your father’s household and go to the land I will show you…4 So Abram left, as the LORD had told him; and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he set out from Haran. 5 He took his wife Sarai, his nephew Lot, all the possessions they had accumulated and the people they had acquired in Haran, and they set out for the land of Canaan, and they arrived there” (Genesis 12:1,4).
There is no record of Abram equivocating, hesitating, or agonizing over this command to leave the area he was fron and to set off for parts unknown. Instead, we see God speaking and Abram moving, putting God’s word into action immediately. This week, I have been thinking a good deal about promptings and action. We live in a world of many promptings from many places: work, school, news reports, magazines, the Internet…the dryer buzzer. The dryer buzzer?
When I started working full time a couple of years ago, it was plain that some of our routines needed to change. The boys and their father took on some extra responsibilities, and I have to say that they do a pretty good job. The boys are pretty good about taking care of their chores and not whining when I remind them. But they still don’t do things as I would do them. And I’m not talking about being slap-dash here or refusing to do the work; instead, the biggest issue is that they stick to the things that I delineate and remind them to do. They have not yet matured to the point of looking at a room, seeing it needs tidying, and then feeling a prompting to tidy. Likewise, when it’s laundry day, all of us will hear the dryer buzzing that the load of laundry is finished…but I am the only one to whom that buzzing indicates that something should be done.
I was fussing about this a little to myself when I realized that it is a reminder of how my spiritual walk is being refined, day by day. How often, I wonder, does my Father sit and think, “Why isn’t she doing what she knows she ought to do? Why, when the Holy Spirit is prompting her to do the right thing, when she knows the right thing to do, why doesn’t she do it?” Why don’t I interpret that “buzzing dryer” as an impetus to do what ought to be done?
When I think back to how I got to the point of understanding that household promptings meant that I should do something about a situation, I realize that there were several components: first, an awareness of how things ought to be done. Second, an awareness that I had a responsibility to do things. And third, a lot of practicing the same routines over and over to strengthen those habits and increase my awareness of the promptings that require immediate attention.
This is how our Christian journey is, too. First, we have to know that there is a path that ought to be followed. That has to be joined with the understanding that because there is a way things should be done, we should do them. And then we have to practice and practice practice until we can do it automatically, without hesitation, without pause. To put it into social terms, most of us probably don’t have to think, “Oh, I should probably say ‘thank you’ for this gift that I was just given. Should I say it or not? Oh, I guess I could.” We just automatically say, “Thank you.” But this small action is built upon practice that was forced on us and an awareness that was built into us by our parents or some other concerned authority. We learned that “Thank you” is what you say when someone does something for you. And now, we don’t have to think about it–we just do it.
James reminds us in James 1:22-25, “22Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. 23Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror 24and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. 25But the man who looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues to do this, not forgetting what he has heard, but doing it—he will be blessed in what he does.”
If we know what we ought to do, and we know that we ought to do it, then what remains is to follow the laws of God as closely as we can, as often as we hear that prompting. Over time, if we pay attention and focus on doing these things, they will become as automatic as thank you, as insistent as a dryer buzzing to call our attention to carrying out a duty. Over time, we will begin to do things God’s way without constant reminding. Let’s listen for those promptings and set our focus on learning what we ought to be doing!
Thanks, Katherine! Next time the dryer buzzer goes off, you have planted some new thoughts to flood into my mind. Hope I can also remember to do something about it! (Except for those times when Becky has been doing special care clothing that she doesn’t want me to mess up!)
This is an excellent reflection, and a very rich analogy! The timer on my dryer is actually broken, and I have to remember to stop it myself. I usually forget until I randomly hear the clothes banging around after it’s been drying for a couple of hours, lol.
Kat, thank you so much for this post…I think very often of…and indeed prayer that my attitude is like…Abraham’s immediate and unquestioning (faith) response to God in every situation recorded for our instruction. He never asked why, where, what when God told him to leave. He just did it.
He waited 25 years for God to fulfill His promise of a son (what patience, even though at the beginning is the only bit of incredulousness we ever see on Abraham’s part, as well as Sarah’s), and when God then asked Him to give that son of promise up as a sacrifice, we don’t see Abraham asking for any time to prepare, say goodbye, delay fulfilling the request.
It’s truly an example of how we should respond to God, to His spirit, and I think you hit on the key that the only way to do that consistently, in fact, unhesitatingly, is by practice, practice, practice. This is not a calling that is ethereal or theoretical, but instead a proactive, action-based, way of living (and becoming…as we mirror God and Christ) that must be who we eventually who and what we are.
Great post…thanks for the reminders.