I went to work today. Not really an unusual occurrence, but today was worse than usual. (I want to say “excruciating,” but that’s a little over the top, even for me.)
To start the day off right, I overslept. Of course, that’s not unusual, because I oversleep three days out of five. I always intend to get up at least half-an-hour early for devotions. But somehow I often spend that half-hour fading in and out of consciousness while debating whether to get up right this minute or sometime in the next five or ten minutes. But this morning, I didn’t go through the twilight-zone debate; I just slept too hard and woke up too late, in a panic because there was light coming through the window.
Since I had no time, I had no breakfast. And the office was freezing. I mean 65 unbelievable degrees. Fahrenheit. Really cold. So of course I was visited by the cough that’s been hanging on since I recovered from my annual bout with bronchitis. And my fingers were too cold to work the keyboard. And the small project that wasn’t due until the second or third week in May is now, inexplicably, due by the 5th. Can anything else go wrong, Lord? Help me get through this day!
And He did. In the middle of a 15-hour afternoon, just when Boxy 2 (that’s my computer; the computer-naming process is another story) froze and had to be re-booted AGAIN. My mounting frustration, my irritation with everybody and everything (including myself), my petty, petty prickly mood–in the middle of all that pettiness, the Lord treated me to small samples of His perspective and His peace.
Just like that. I prayed, “Lord, help me get through this day.” My Lord responded by showing me that:
(1) In the real world (outside my self-referential focus on me), this is not really a bad day. Being awakened by an earthquake collapsing your home around you may be the beginning of a bad day. Opening your eyes to see light streaming through your bedroom windows is not. Ditto for my other “disasters.”
(2) Even if this were inded a really bad day, some chemical cocktail like Prozac or Ambien is not the calmative of choice for me. Not that I couldn’t use some chemical help, but the most effective mind- and mood-altering drug is the peace of God–and God, despite His majesty, His power, His incomprehensible glory, is willing to put His finger on non-majestic, powerless, and non-glorious me and give me just the right daily dose of Divine peace to get me through every day of my life.
What started out as an “unbearable” 20-hour day at work turned into the Lord’s Day: the day, like every other day in my life, that the Lord has made. And thanks to Him, I can rejoice and be glad in it.
Not too shabby for a day at work.