I'm sitting here at my keyboard and I'm stuck with nothing to say at the moment. I've neglected my blog for sometime, partly because I was so busy working and taking care of my family that I didn't have the time to write. Now that I'm no longer working I don't have that excuse anymore. Hopefully you can bear with me because this is like pulling teeth to even get these words out of my head and onto the screen.
Writers will tell you that to jump the hurdle of writer's block you need to just start with one word and go from there. So that's what I am trying to do. The problem isn't that I don't have anything to say, but that I have so much to say but can't share much of what is going on in my life. I don't think I have writer's block, I think I have an emotional block.
You're probably wondering where I'm going with this line of thinking...so am I. I don't know if you have ever had a block of some sort, writer's or otherwise. They aren't fun and they can disrupt your thinking and even physical activity. Even writing this paragraph I have deleted it several times because I can't seem to get my thoughts out correctly. It's extremely frustrating as I type, delete, type, delete...you get the picture. My brain is all jumbled up and one of the reasons is that I waited too long to write this blog. I'm now out of practice and like exercise, if I don't do it everyday I get out of shape, lose lean muscle and my body turns flabby. My brain is just that: flabby.
As I contemplated this writing block I realized how similar my spiritual walk with the Lord has been in the past. There were times I would think of reasons not to read my Bible, do a study, spend time talking to God. I got caught up in life and the busyness of it. There was always something that needed to be done before I could sit down and have quiet time. I noticed a few days of missing my quiet time but if I ignored it long enough I would get through the whole day without giving the Lord a second thought unless it was for a quick prayer like, "Lord, help me find my car keys" or "Lord, help me find my debit card." My life just got too busy for God.
But then something happened in my life. It jerked me back from the path I was on and I remembered that this life was not about working out, soccer practices, praying for a bigger home or a nicer car. The world as I knew it crashed and burned and I fell to my knees and cried out to the Lord. I knew he was there but it had been awhile since I had called on him in such desperation. I had forgotten him for too long and had to start at square one. I didn't know him as well as I used to and I hadn't talked to him for so long that my prayers felt stunted as I groped for the words to say to him.
A friend once gave me the advice to keep your accounts short with God. In other words, always be confessing sins when you realized you've sinned. It sounds funny but it's true. When I sat down and talked to him I had a lot of confessing to do because I hadn't been keeping up on it. I couldn't come before the Throne of God and ask for something if I didn't first ask for his forgiveness of my sins. I also had to reacquaint myself with who he is, his character and how much he loved me. That all seemed foreign to me even though I knew the right 'church-y' answers. It was like seeing an old friend from school. After the initial hug and "Hi, how ya' doing?" it takes time to get back the closeness of your friendship you shared years before. Things have happened over the years and if you didn't keep in contact over that time you have to start at square one.
The Lord doesn't change but we do. If too much has happened, too many bad decisions made, or too much devastation occurred than we often feel like we can't just come back to Christ. But we can. The enemy would love for us to always feel separated from Jesus, feel like we are too bad to come back to him, but those are lies. We can come back no matter how far we've run from him, whether it was purposely or unintentionally. He was behind us all the time. I believe it was C.S. Lewis who referred to God as the 'hound of Heaven'. He will come after those who are his children and when he does the best thing you can do is turn around and run back into his arms. It will take some time to get to know him again but it's possible.
I'm still struggling with writing this blog. I'm still deleting what I type and it's taken me awhile to get this written, but now the words are coming faster and I'm remembering how to do this. I can't let the difficulties and frustrations stop me from finishing what I've started. I have to keep going not only with this entry but with more to come. It might take some more time for my thoughts to flow more easily, but once I get over this little bump in the road it'll become easier to do once again. It's the same with my walk with the Lord. Now that I've been in his word for awhile it's easier to talk to him all the time and I desire to spend time with him.
I don't know what your block might be. You do though. I think the tip of how to get over writer's block can work well for a spiritual block too. Just like you start with putting one word on the page, you can also start with saying one word out loud to God like "Hi."
You just might be surprised where you'll end up.
