Still learning

Good morning - it's a beautiful Wednesday morning here! It is hard to believe that August is half over and summer is winding down already. In many areas of the country school has started. Having 2 sons and 2 daughters-in-law that are teachers, the start of school is always a big thing in our family. And this year, we have 2 granddaughters starting first grade and kindergarten, and a grandson beginning pre-K! They are growing up so quickly!

This week I have been enjoying some needed down-time at home. Last week was a very busy week with Vacation Bible School and a lot of other things going on, and I really felt the need to spend a few days at home and get caught up on a lot of things and "re-charged." I am very thankful for the opportunity to do that - to "come apart and rest for awhile." One of the things I have been doing this week is reviewing and reflecting on recent entries in my quiet-time journal. One of these days I will be blogging about the benefits of journaling because I LOVE to journal!

Lately it seems like the Lord is impressing on me over and over again (which usually means that I need it!) the thought of learning - learning who He is and what He has for me. I have been reading through the gospel of Mark. I am amazed by how slow Jesus' disciples were to learn, but isn't that a lot like us? We are so slow to learn and so easily distracted! The end of Mark chapter 6 is about the feeding of the five thousand followed by the miracle of Jesus walking on the water. The disciples were overcome by fear from not knowing who was walking toward them. The verse that caught my attention was Mark 6:52 - "for His disciples had not gained any insight from the miracle of the loaves, but their heart was hardened." You would think that after personally seeing Jesus do such a big miracle that there would be no more doubts about who He was, but they were not in the right position to learn from Him - their hearts were not open. In Mark 8, the disciples were in the boat with Jesus following another miracle, the feeding of the 4,000, and all they could talk about was the fact that they had forgotten to bring any bread. I would like to think that if it was me, I would not be worried about what I was going to eat because I would be so focused on Jesus - but I am more like the disciples than I would care to admit. Verses 16-17 - "They began to discuss with one another the fact that they had no bread. And Jesus, aware of this, said to them, why do you reason that you have no bread? do you not yet see or understand? Do you have a hardened heart?" They had totally missed Jesus' provision for them and for 4,000 other people. They were so focused on their own lives and their own problems that they missed who Jesus was and what He could do.

In my teen girls Sunday School class, I have been teaching about two of my favorite Biblical women, Mary and Martha. And it strikes me that it goes right along with the theme of learning from Jesus. In Luke 10:38-42, Martha is so busy doing things FOR Jesus that she isn't spending any time WITH Him. It wasn't that she wasn't doing a good thing - she was, because Jesus never rebukes her for her service for Him. It's just that she wasn't doing the "one needful thing" - taking the time to learn from Jesus and nurturing a more intimate relationship with Him. It's a reminder that in addition to having a "hardened heart" like the disciples had, that the busyness of serving God can take away from the importance of knowing God.

So today, I hope you will do some thinking about being in the right position spiritually to learn what God has for you, about being so focused on your own life that you miss what He wants to teach you about Himself, and about keeping the right balance between knowing Him and serving Him.

With a thoughtful heart,
Kathi