My shower routine goes something like this:
1) Boil water in kettle.
2) Pour boiled water down shower drain to unblock frozen pipe.
3) Turn on shower for 10 minutes to heat shower room/floor.
4) Undress and jump into the shower as fast as possible.
5) Dance around because numb toes feel like they're on fire.
6) Flail for shampoo because there's too much fog to actually see where it is.
7) Relax and soak in the hot water and enjoy the warmth of the shower.
Steps 4, 5, and 6 make me wish I could use baby wipes and never use the shower during the frigid winter months. Every night I dread #4,5,6 because it is painfully cold. And the dreaded anticipation has, on occasion, gotten the best of me.
I think going to God for grace is often like taking a shower in the winter. I get everything ready to go and talk to God and ask for forgiveness. I block off my calendar, turn off my phone, get off Facebook. I sit in silence and I wait. I wait for that moment when my heart is still and silent. Somewhere in that process I panic. I panic because I know what's coming next and it'll be painful. The soul searching and the sin killing and the heart cleansing are painful. I have to take that deep breath and just go for it, run in at full abandonment. And it does hurt. But it hurts in the way that my numb toes hurt when they're defrosting--they hurt with life coming back into them. Stumbling and bumbling and flailing for hope, for something familiar, and it's always in the same place--the Word. And I can rest and relax and enjoy being showered in God's grace.
So tonight after I play nagaho for 2 hours out on the ice and my toes are purple and frozen solid, as I dance around in the shower, I'll thank God for the pain that brings life...to my toes and my heart.
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