as i have begun to study and think about spiritual practices i am less and less satisfied with the often-used analogy of practicing piano scales in preparation to play beethoven someday. instead, i find myself drawn to the idea that spiritual practices are really just the stories that we repeat to ourselves. i am convinced that the practices i embody - the stories i tell myself - have real impact right now, not just in some possible performance to come. as i practice, i am embodying the truth i know. i am reminding myself with the greatest force i have, my very body, to remember what is true.
there are stories i tell myself without meaning too. when i choose to eat a double-double with fries (or more realistically, when i continually choose diet coke over water) i am quietly telling myself that the story of a God who has promised to someday resurrect this body of mine isn’t fully true. i am suggesting to myself that the physicality of this body doesn’t really matter.
with each episode of the bachelorette i watch or norah roberts book i read i am whispering to myself that i have been promised - that i deserve - a husband. i am rehearsing the story that surely my prince charming is on his way to rescue me from the doldrums of singleness and surely (surely!) we will live happily ever after.
these are not the best stories to be telling myself.
there are, though, stories of truth that i am actively choosing to tell myself. i sit in a large room each sunday morning surrounded by people like me and unlike me. there are newly married couples, empty-nested parents and people i honestly don’t like to be around. we gather to pray and rest. we sing and grieve and listen. and in that hour i remind myself of the grand story of the worship that is to come. of the indescribable, infinite time that i will spend gathered around the throne with the faithful of all time, worshipping the one true god.
as i order my day around a set schedule of prayers i tell myself the story of the God that ordered the universe and holds time in his hand. i remind myself that the agenda of the kingdom is far greater than my personal plans for the day.
i clip on my chaplains badge and walk into a children’s emergency room to remind myself of a God that took on human flesh and entered into this mess of human grief and suffering. i spend my friday afternoons practicing to myself the story of the incarnation.
and so i am beginning to come to grips with the idea that the way i live this life has significant implications for today and for eternity. i am beginning to force myself to look past the surface of my sleep schedule or my finances to discern what stories i am telling myself - to question the truth of the narratives i am rehearsing. it has become my hope that as i begin to root out the lies i whisper to myself that the story my life tells will be a tale that is daily more full of truth and more often overflowing with grace.
