day three of the fast: observation

Day three of the fast: observation:

When I heard these things, I sat down and wept. For some days I mourned and fasted and prayed before the God of heaven. (Nehemiah 1:4)

Today has been an emotional one for me. The knowledge of my sin comes upon me. Couple that with the knowledge of my failure before God to do what he sent me to do makes it almost too hard to bear.

After all, we are all failures before God. He gives us grace and love and mercy and we screw the whole thing up. It seems like everyday in every way we crucify the Son of God afresh.

And on this, the third day, it comes back to me in spades. I guess that by this time, the lack, the deprivation gets me to thinking about how vulnerable I really am.

I am a big man and always have been. I have at times been the strongest man I knew. And I have to admit, I liked the strength and the size I had.

Now I am older and the strength is, for the most part, gone. Like a lot of 61 year old men, I am no longer the man I used to be. Looking at pictures of Arnold Schwartzenegger the other day, I realized that he too is in that condition. He is a couple of years older than I am and still looks a lot better than I do, but at the same time, he is no longer the phenomenally ripped specimen that he used to be.

I never was ripped or anything like that. I liked to eat too much and didn’t have the eye of the tiger when it came to body-building. I was just strong. But that goes away sooner or later. Sooner or later, as the word says, the grass withers, the flower fades.

It is the Word of God that lasts. It is he, the Word, the Savior, the Redeemer, Jesus, that One who is the same yesterday, today and tomorrow.

He lasts. I do not.

And today I feel it. Today I know that I am temporary and he is eternal. Today I know that I decrease but he increases. Today I am aware of the fact that I am on my way out, but he is and always has been and always will be eternal.

And I mourn my sin and my failure.

Today again all of the pain and rejection comes back and visits me. I hate it, but I know that it is part of the fasting process.

If I am to know him, I also have to know myself. And I have to know that I am flawed. And I am. And I know it, painfully so.

It was Jesus who said, in Matthew 5 and the Sermon on the Mount, blessed are those who mourn, for they shall see the kingdom of heaven. O Lord, I mourn. I mourn me and my life, I mourn our young people and the bill of goods they have been sold by the world and satan, I mourn my wife’s illness, my son’s rejection of you, my daughter’s almost frantic quest for love and happiness. I mourn.

Father God, increase me in you. Decrease me in me. Make me more aware of you and your grace in my life. forgive m, Lord, of my sins and my shortcomings. I love you and I praise you for who you are. Amen.