Some routines are necessary...we have to shower, we have to brush our teeth, we have to get dressed, we have to eat...those are the necessary routines of every day life.
Other routines may not be "as necessary" but something we become accustomed to nonetheless making them customary. For example, one of my closest friends calls me every single morning...I can expect the call at about the same time every morning. Yesterday, when I didn't get that call...it threw my morning completely off! When I sent a text message asking if everything was okay, the response with "Yes, y?" I said that I was asking because I didn't get my "routine" call...and that it threw my morning routine off. The response??? "That's y!" And then my phone rang, and guess who??? I asked if throwing my routine off had been done on purpose. It led to a conversation, which was lighthearted and fun, about my OCD tendencies and how he was "helping" me with those by breaking my routine!
As lighthearted and fun as the conversation was; however, it got me thinking (rather deeply) about routines. He is not a man to be predicted or get into a rut...I, on the other hand, sometimes live by routines and customary practices. The impact of our conversation hit me like a ton of bricks, and I started asking myself questions about why the "routine" of him calling me was so important!
My immediate answer was just simply because I like the sound of his voice in the morning - it wraps around me like a warm blanket; I feel comforted when I hear from him; he just makes me feel better. But I had an epiphany through it all...and that was that it really isn't the "routine" that I missed the most. It was the content of that routine...who it involved, what it meant to me, how it made me feel that I really missed the most. Does that make it sound like it's all about me? Perhaps...but just knowing that he takes a few minutes out of an already hurried schedule to just talk for a minute or two, goes beyond just how I feel...it goes to the heart of what we share, which is an incredible friendship.
Parallel to that is how much more do our daily conversations with God mean to Him? Does He miss our "routine" of communing with Him? When we hear His voice, do we feel comforted...do we enjoy the content of our relationship with Him? Do we share an "incredible friendship" with our ultimate Friend? Just like my friend's voice comforts me, I need my Father's voice to comfort me. I want to maintain my relationship with Him and not allow it to become just another daily routine.
**Lord, it is with a grateful heart that I come to you this day. Thanking you for
allowing my path to cross with people who inspire me. Thank you for friends
that care and love me, sometimes even in spite of me. Thank you for the gift of ultimate
friendship...yours. I know that "I am a friend of God, and you call me friend."
Help me to have a daily communion with you...to not allow my walk with
you to become just another daily routine. Help me to preserve my
time with you as the precious moments they were designed to be.
Bless this day and all that come across my path. Help me to be
a light and a witness to others in a new and refreshing way. Amen"
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