Day 1: Sowing and Reaping

The first of the year already sees and upset in my new schedule! It would seem that I can't even awaken on Day One to this new monastic life. However, given that I was awake for the first 2.5 hours of the year, deep in conversation with Christian brothers over a weave of great topics in Scripture, I have to give myself some credit for kicking the year off with my first meditations on the deep things of God.

So I finally awakened, not having heard my 0600 alarm this morning (I gave myself a one hour break since I wasn't in bed until 0245), at about 0830! Not a great start to a self-imposed, rigorous schedule, but I have all of this New Year's Day to enjoy football in the background and Scripture in the foreground. And I started my late morning by completing my reading in Galatians, discovering a great statement for a morning meditation:

"The one who sows to please his sinful nature, from that nature will reap destruction; the one who sows to please the Spirit, from the Spirit will reap eternal life." (6:8)

Paul has a way of making it simple. This year will be a year of discovery and of course correction. I will discover many things I have been doing that have fed my sin nature. Having fed that monster, I have lost some connection with the Spirit, who in many cases has suffered starvation in my daily walk. Once I have learned to take all thoughts (and actions) captive and make them obedient to Christ, the Spirit will thrive in me while the sin nature withers away from malnutrition. As Paul also shares, "...what counts is a new creation."

One more thought by Paul in Galatians: "May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world." (6:14) Am I crucified to the world as Paul was? I think not, yet. I sit now a strong skeptic about whether even after this year, I will be. I worry that I will not gain the results I pray for, or that I will fail in my weakness.

But Paul makes it so easy: "So I say, live by the Spirit, and you will nt gratify the desires of the sinful nature." (5:16) God grant me the strength and discipline to live out the ease of this statement.