Unfaithfulness

I don’t want to get legalistic about posting here, but I missed yesterday, which is odd because I spent the day at home, the car never left the driveway.   I’ve only missed one other day since starting this; it’s easy to get distracted.   Unnecessary distractions.   I’m trying to remain faithful to this because I see faithfulness as a virtue worth cultivating on an ongoing basis.

When I think of the opposite — unfaithfulness — I often think of Jesus and his disciples in the garden of Gethsemane.

^{Mark 14: 37}Then he returned to his disciples and found them sleeping. “Simon,” he said to Peter, “are you asleep? Could you not keep watch for one hour? ³⁸Watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation. The spirit is willing, but the body is weak.”

³⁹Once more he went away and prayed the same thing. ⁴⁰When he came back, he again found them sleeping, because their eyes were heavy. They did not know what to say to him.

⁴¹Returning the third time, he said to them, “Are you still sleeping and resting? Enough! The hour has come.

Maybe it was the wine.   The passover meal included four instances of “taking the cup;” although the gospel accounts record, at best, only two of these.   Four glasses of wine would do it.   But the same translation, NIV, has the equivalent of verse 40 saying, “he found them asleep, exhausted from sorrow.” (Luke 22: 45) (Sorrow, or grief over his clear delineation of his death, or at least, his impending ‘leaving them.’)

Anyway, for me, at 11:50 last night when I realized I’d missed a day, it was the same type of voice saying, “Could you not write a few lines; embed another worship song; find a quotation?”   I guess your definition of faithfulness may vary.   Here’s The Message on the Luke verses:

^37-38He came back and found them sound asleep. He said to Peter, “Simon, you went to sleep on me? Can’t you stick it out with me a single hour? Stay alert, be in prayer, so you don’t enter the danger zone without even knowing it. Don’t be naive. Part of you is eager, ready for anything in God; but another part is as lazy as an old dog sleeping by the fire.”

^39-40He then went back and prayed the same prayer. Returning, he again found them sound asleep. They simply couldn’t keep their eyes open, and they didn’t have a plausible excuse.

I guess sometimes when distractions keep us from sticking to a spiritual discipline, we really don’t have a plausible excuse.

Here’s a final verse from Matthew 25 (NIV):

“His master replied, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant! You have been faithful with a few things; I will put you in charge of many things. Come and share your master’s happiness!’