Temptation to Vacation

This past week, I have vacationed.  I’ve slept late.  The kids haven’t had school, so I haven’t been teaching.  I got way behind on laundry.  I haven’t had anything to prepare for at church.  Geoff and I had a getaway.   I ate Chateaubriande and indulged in desserts.  I have taken a break from all of my responsibilities.

And I’ve taken a break from devoting myself to my Lord. 

It’s curious to me that, during this week of vacation, when I found more time to spend quality relational time with the people that I love, I found less time to relate to Him.

A.W. Tozer reminds me, “God is a person, and in the deep of His mighty nature He thinks, wills, enjoys, feels, loves, desires, and suffers as any other person may.  In making Himself known to us He stays by the familiar pattern of personality.  He communicates with us through the avenues of our minds, our wills and our emotions.  The continuous and unembarrassed interchange of love and thought between God and the soul of the redeemed man is the throbbing heart of New Testament religion.”

If I truly know God as a person, why is it that I am still tempted to view conversations with Him as a responsibility?  A duty?

There have been many times in our marriage when I have found myself at moments of choosing… to take the hard road of moving toward my husband when every sinful tendency in me wants to avoid.  In those moments, the temptation to flee… to hide… to vacation from the relationship is overwhelmingly strong. 

It’s this temptation that has crept into my life with my Lord lately… to vacation from the relationship. 

And yet, it’s the grace of my husband’s love and the promises he made that draw me back and keep me pressing into the hard work of staying connected, confessing my temptation to vacation even as I choose to unpack my bags and stay home with him.

Thomas a Kempis said, “Temptations reveal who we are… And yet, temptations can be useful to us even though they seem to cause us nothing but pain.  They are useful because they can make us humble, they can cleanse us, and they can teach us… the key to victory is true humility and patience; in them we overcome the enemy.”

Love draws me.  Grace keeps me.  I sadly confess my temptation to vacation… and begin to unpack my bags.