With school throughout the week and the work, studying and homework that accompanies it, I literally look forward to the weekend as a time to recuperate and recharge the batteries to be able to make it through the coming week. This weekend has been proportionally lazy as the week had been laborious while simultaneously helpful. Just having come through a week full of midterms and a very annoying ecological presentation about “saving the rainforest,” the weekend looked well-appetizing as 2.5 days to be a sloth.
But being a sloth means being slothful, and slothful I was. Friday afternoon was entirely filled with one extensive nap, with the exception of running to Giant Eagle to get groceries and returning to make some lip-smackin’ tostados. After my last exam of the week Friday I was home free to do everything I wanted: nothing. Saturday morning was equally as exciting; one extensive nap and one trip out to the busy, real world (this time to the Mountaineer Balloon Festival at Mylan Park).
The interesting thing to note about Saturday is that I awoke at 6:00am when Emily left for work. I lay on the couch until about 7:00am pottering around on my computer and then steadied myself on my two feet and made it to the kitchen to unload the dish washer and make Kool-Aid (blue raspberry). I also made a little trip to the boy’s room and stopped by the bedroom on the trip back to the couch, picking up two book hitchhikers along the way, my Bible and Martin Luther’s The Bondage of the Will. Now we get to the interesting part.
Returning to the couch at 8:00am, I had a choice to make which would determine the outcome of the rest of the day. Choice one and the most appetizing: continue scouring the depths of the internet for who knows what. To be honest though, I had convinced myself that I could justify my need to be on the computer by making some tweaks to the WVSnap web site, a noble enough task. At the same time I knew that if I succumbed to the enticement of the bright crystal display of my laptop, I would find myself hours later wondering where the time had gone and the books would be untouched. But I convinced myself that I could handle some time on the computer while still being able to part from it in good time.
It’s now Sunday morning and awoke on the couch to find the books staring a me, untouched since Saturday (though Luther’s Bondage did serve as a coaster for a glass of that fine, blue, sugary Kool-Aid).
My point? The same as the Peter’s point:
The time that is past suffices for doing what the Gentiles want to do, living in sensuality, passions, drunkenness, orgies, drinking parties, and lawless idolatry (1 Peter 4:3).
Though a Gentile, I am a new creation in Christ and should spend my time redeeming the time.
Look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise but as wise, making the best use of the time, because the days are evil. Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is (Ephesians 5:15-17).
Ironically, Luther’s Bondage lay on the coffee table while my soul on the couch acted out the premise of the book: the will of the flesh is bound to sin; the redeemed will has been given the choice to not sin.
With [my] new-birth, God-given ability to choose: I chose what I was once confined to only choose; namely, to be unwise and foolish, not understanding the will of the Lord.
