Dirty Pair of Underwear & the Will of God.

This morning I was doing my morning readings and prayers, but I just wasn't "feeling" it.
Surely, I am not the only one who feels like they are just going through the motions in my daily faith routine because you know it is the right thing to do.

I had read the daily Mass readings and then I was onto the morning prayers for the liturgy of the hours, but I was feeling entirely uninspired. I knew what I was doing was good and right, but it felt as dry as a piece of stale toast. I knew in my head by being faithful and disciplined in prayer and study when I first arise for a new day that He has given me to do His will on earth, these acts give glory and homage to God.

I knew all this, but when nothing stirs the heart,
it feels kind of like a waste of time. 

I was starting to fall into the temptation to rush through it all just to be done. I stopped. Closed my eyes and tried to refocus. I was going about it all wrong. I was upset with the lack of inspiration that morning because I was focused on what I could get out of the prayers and readings for myself.

I never stopped to ask God what he wanted from me for the day.

Then a verse from the first reading popped into my head.

"The people shall be like a loin cloth
which is good for nothing."
~Jeremiah 13:10

God was saying this to his people because they had forgotten Him in their willful pride of being a pleasure seeking culture. Pursuing false gods and idols while embracing every physical pleasure this world had to offer.

So God basically tells Jeremiah to buy a new loincloth, a new pair of underwear if you will. He does. After wearing it, God tells him then not to wash it, but rather to go to a certain place and bury it. Obediently Jeremiah does as the Lord said without question. After a long interval, Jeremiah hears the Lord telling him to go and dig up the dirty underwear, loincloth, he had buried.

I wonder if in his obedience to the Lord,
if Jeremiah felt as silly as all this sounds! 

Once again, Jeremiah was obedient and dug it up. He found it was "rotted and good for nothing"!

I, for one, would be wondering "Why God?
What are you trying to tell me?"

The scriptures say nothing about Jeremiah questioning God in all of this.  He faithfully and obediently proceeded to do everything that was asked of him. Believing that God had a good reason that he might not have been able to understand at the time.

When he had dug up the loincloth God said to him,

"So also will I allow that pride of Judah to rot, the great pride of Jerusalem. This wicked people refuse to obey my words, who walk in the stubbornness of their hearts, and follow strange gods to serve and adore them, shall be like this loincloth which is good for nothing. For as close as a loin cloth clings to a man’s loins, so I made the house of Israel and the whole house of Judah to cling to me...to be my people, my renown, my praise, my beauty." ~Jeremiah 13:9-10

We are made to glorify God and sing His praise. Jeremiah shows us that even when we might not understand the why, it is important to set aside your own curiosity, your pride and obey the will of God. Even the silly, the mundane and the ordinary things of our life in this world, like chores, routines and work must be done in loving obedience to God because that is what we are made.

For to do live any other was is to "follow strange gods...[which] like this loincloth is good for nothing."

When I started writing that morning, I prayed for the Holy Spirit to open the eyes and ears of my heart to make the word of God living for me. Out of obedience, I began to write the word in this post because that is what I am called to do. For Jesus has said to me in prayer, "Write down all you see and hear. Come to me daily in the garden."

Going to Jesus in the garden was difficult at first because I was unfamiliar with the way, but I was led by those who have gone before me to a place my Lord likes to pray. A place we are all called to go.
In this culture of "me" contentedness, embrace the ordinary with the love of God for through obedience we are giving praise and glory to God. It is what we are made for...Hallelujah! Amen!

So the next time you are feeling uninspired in prayer, think of Jeremiah. He was obedient in digging up a pair of rotten underwear because God asked him to in order to teach us the importance of discipline and obedience, especially when it seems silly and does not make sense to us!

We are called to trust in the Lord.
To follow the will of the Father and not our own.