If you’re a Monty Python fan, you’ll get the reference. If not, there’s always YouTube.
The last six months since I have posted have been quite eventful in meatspace for me. Our family made the decision to attend a new church, a big church (but not quite mega), a church with great teaching, a lot more resources and a more generous orthodoxy than the old one. But without our friends. It was a pretty heart-wrenching decision for us, but in the end I think it was the right one for our growth as a family into Christ.
I’ve also spent much of the last six months struggling with depression, going back and forth between a feeling that it’s all too hard and I should get over it and just live a “normal American Christian life” and a longing to follow Christ with all of my heart, soul, mind, and strength. In the end, Christ always leads me back. Most recently, he has used the Daily Office to bring me back. One of my goals for the year was to pray the morning and evening office each day, and at least for the last week, I have been back on that track. And it has made all the difference. May Christ have mercy on me to let me continue.
The next goal on my list that I hope to tackle is to serve the poor at least once per month as a family. My new church has a weekly ministry to the homeless, and I hope to start by attending that with my oldest son one per month and then go from there. Our hearts were made to serve the lost, the least, and the wounded, and we need to take this small step to start acting like the citizens of the Kingdom of God that we are.
It’s not easy to follow Christ with three children and a job that when combined with commute takes up 50-60 hours per week (my prayer is that God would lead me in time to a new job which no longer requires the long commute, but with the economy as it is, I will need an extra portion of his grace to find it!). But I’m back on the wagon, trying. May Christ have mercy.