If you're following along with the Scripture Memory / Dwell Richly printable, here's the verse for week 8:
For you were called to freedom, brothers. Only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another. Galatians 5:13 (ESV)
This is the moment…
where I can choose to be angry about our dishwasher with standing water or I can choose to be grateful for the fact that we even have a dishwasher
where I can curse the realities of home ownership or I can be grateful for the beautiful home God has given us as shelter and as a place for friends and family to gather in community
where I can choose to get agitated with JD for not pushing a magic button and fixing it within minutes or I can be grateful for a husband who didn’t let it sit there untouched for days, and tries everything within himself to figure out a way to make our dishwasher work so that we don’t have to use our finances to pay someone else to do it
where I can flip out about having a messy kitchen for a day or two or I can be thankful for everything in it and be reminded that messes are necessary so that God can restore order and make us clean
where I can choose to be frustrated about having puddles of water sitting on our kitchen floor or I can choose to be grateful for absorbent towels that I can throw into a working washing machine later tonight
where I can act like a child of selfishness for not being able to watch “my Monday night shows” or I can stand tall as a daughter of righteousness, washed by the blood of the Lamb and remember that it’s more important to support my husband than it is for me to watch “my shows” (plus, it’s not like I can’t stream the shows tomorrow)
where we can be bitter at the fact we’re up late working or we can choose to be grateful for the day of rest we had yesterday and be thankful for a comfy place to lay our heads after a hard day’s work
where I can choose to be a child of darkness, cloaked in sin
or I can return to the Lord and walk in His light
While I’d like to say “I choose to return to the Lord and walk in His light,” it’s a choice that can only be made because of Jesus. It’s certainly not the initial reaction I had last night.
I prayed yesterday morning that God would reveal to me the depths of my sin so that I may have a better understanding of the depths of His grace. [heavy sigh] It didn’t take long before my ‘not such a big deal’ sins came to light.
But it especially hit me last night as I stood (and tried to help) in the kitchen for two hours, watching my husband work tediously to figure out the source of our dishwasher’s problems. All of the former thoughts above were my legit thoughts. Thoughts of selfishness, ingratitude, anger, impatience. Quickly following, the Spirit convicted me, revealed my sin and reminded me of the response I should have because I am a temple of the living God. He dwells in me, purifying me and reconciling me to Him on a constant basis.
So what was wrong with the dishwasher? We're not entirely sure. JD completely disassembled the inside, only to find that nothing is broken or blocking the filter, sump, etc. He put it all back together again, ran a cycle and it ran perfectly. Once again, we were faced with the choice of being super upset about time wasted and a faulty dishwasher issue or we can laugh it off and be super grateful that all is well, we don't have to pay a mechanic, and praise God for taking care of us.
