July 19, 2022 – Click here to listen
My wife asked me yesterday if I thought I would ever get caught up. My day begins long before daylight and does not end until around midnight only to repeat itself the next day. I thought about this question this morning and decided that I will not ever get caught up. I listed my projects and though purportedly I’m “retired” I’m busier than a one-armed paper hanger.
I like to be busy. I do get exhausted especially lately, but I rest up and start anew. A friend told me the other day that I love a good project and the bigger it is the more I seem to like it. He is right. I especially like to take something that is subpar and turn it into something beautiful. Be it building or remodeling a house, beautifying the natural surroundings that I’m in, planting beautiful flowers, or whatever I want to improve the existing condition somehow.
This trait doesn’t just apply to the physical but to the spiritual as well. I identify flaws that I have and work hard to conquer them altogether. Some are more difficult than others. My temper for one has caused me no small amount of grief throughout my life. Interestingly I have more control over it now than ever. I don’t know why I used to be angry all the time, but I’m not now and that is what is important. Cleaning up my language is something that has also plagued me all my life. I think I came out of the womb cussing and grew up using profanity as a part of my language and have tried everything from snapping my wrist with rubber bands to fining myself money for each cuss word I uttered. (My charitable causes gleaned much money through the years due to my failure to stop). Lately, however, I have all but stopped with the profanity and can only attribute that progress to answered prayer.
It gives me tremendous satisfaction to look at the before and after of my physical and spiritual projects. Taking something that is run down, dirty, ugly, and overgrown with weeds and then turning it into a thing of beauty takes hard work, but is well worth the effort, (at least to me).
So, I say all of this to answer my wife’s question of whether I think I’ll ever be caught up and the answer is a resounding NO. And I will add to that, nor do I want to get caught up. Projects abound in my life, and I will work hard on them until I go “toe up”, at which point I pray God will give me more projects in heaven. I want to be just like His ever-expanding universe and grow and grow and grow as His beauty removes all ugliness from me and my surroundings.
Colossians 3:23
Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men,