Hello tender friends! My bags of donation items has got me feeling lighter. And getting rid of physical clutter has got me thinking about spiritual clutter.
I’m going to be matter-of-fact: While I initially struggled with adapting to motherhood, it’s a relief now. Because you know what? Motherhood has left me less time to think or wonder if I’m doing the right thing, i.e. less time to commit overt and obvious sins.
So much of motherhood is grounded in the physical reality of cooking, cleaning, changing diapers and tending to your child’s emotions that the capacity for sin is diminished. (Don’t get it twisted- I’m not saying I’m a perfect mom by any means or that I don’t sin against my own child by losing my temper. But the sins that had an allure in youth sound like an exhausting punishment nowadays. Perspective, perspective).
We’re all masters of creating our own suffering through sin when we’re young, aren’t we? As Anthony says when referencing his years of addiction, “If you want to, God will let you choose to suffer a little bit more.” I wasn’t an addict, but I chose some suffering, not realizing that there was another option. My entire adolescence and early 20s felt like Edvard Munch’s “The Scream.”
I wish I could say I always had my priorities straight. “She’s so mature.” “Your daughter really has her head on straight.” “She’ll be able to do anything she wants in life.” These were comments people frequently made to my parents when I was growing up.
Deception, deception, deception. Deception can sometimes be well-intended.
Their words were kind, complimentary and incorrect.
When I first encountered God and realized I’d been living my life very selfishly up until that point, it was hard. How could I have lived my whole life up to that point being relatively “good” and be so blind to how off base I was?
I was a quintessential Type A personality with my i’s dotted and t’s crossed. Achieve, achieve, achieve I chanted as I drifted off to sleep each night. They will love you if you achieve.
Achievement isn’t sinful, but I wasn’t necessarily in perfect alignment with the Father’s will. I was also pretty angry when I realized the gold medal of existence was just a phantom.
Ultimately, as God showed me when we met, everything I’d done up until then was selfish in the sense of not requiring a pouring out of myself for “the least of these.” It was spiritual clutter.
Acknowledging that my priorities were askew is still slightly embarrassing. I feel like I just admitted that I wore my gym clothes again without washing them or something. I have this unhealthy desire to project an image of someone who has always had it together when talking to other humans.
I so badly wish I could be “good” without God’s help. I wish I could love and believe in Jesus but not really be in need of him.
I wonder if I missed opportunities to minister quietly to people because I didn’t even know what ministering to someone else meant. I was too busy flinging myself around the world at warp speed, falsely believing that enough plane rides would result in me escaping myself.
What did God want me to do at that time to serve Him?
I don’t know, because I never thought to ask.
Now I do ask. I’m here to use my time as efficiently as possible to stay in God’s perfect will as often as possible. Everything else is spiritual clutter.
Lord, let my spiritual life be as uncluttered as possible.
Ok, that’s all for today, tender friends! Thank you so much for stopping by.
Thank you to the new friends! For those of you planning your readership, on Monday I will be sharing a post on publishing trends as well as a very short, simple children’s book on antonyms that I wrote recently. I will be sharing my delight with my medley of creamed beet leaves and Swiss chard on Thursday.
Thank you for sharing!
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tea and tenderness 
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