On days I don't have to be somewhere right away, I try to start off with prayer time. Sometimes it flows right away.
Other times, like today, I feel like I don't even know where to begin.
I'm still struggling in that place between the spiritual freedom of plain dress, and the temptation to own more clothing than I could possibly need. I still cannot explain in a single sentence why I'm compelled to wear plain dress. I still ask why so many bad things happen to god people. I still ask God why He gives free will to the people who clearly don't know how to use it correctly.
I consider ripping off my prayer cap, since the last thing I want to do is pray. I start to remember the last supper scene in "All Things New," the annual Easter production at the church I work at. It's a striking production because it's not fluffy. As Jesus washes the disciples' feet, His despair causes His body to sink progressively lower until He is slithering from one person to the next, barely crawling, pushing the bowl of water.
The Savior of the world was in a pit of depression so severe He could barely function.
Even though I was watching actors, something told me this might have been exactly how it happened.
I mull over this for a bit, and then I feel led to pick up Oswald Chambers' My Utmost For His Highest. I flip to today, August 2nd.
It has the very fitting title of "The Teaching of Adversity."
Almost instantly, I feel a little better. Not because I have answers, but because a few more glimmers of light are being shed on my situation.
The call to plain dress mirrors what our brother Oswald Chambers refers to as "being delivered in adversity." When I dress this way, something happens that couldn't happen until I started dressing this way.
As I close the book, I can feel God slowly lifting my withered soul up off the floor.
