A Motor Mouth Failure

When I was a toddler, my older sister nicknamed me Motor Mouth.  A fifteen year age difference separated us, and she was the baby of the family until I showed up.  Julie went from a quiet home to one invaded by a screaming baby – and then once the baby stopped screaming, she started talking – in complete, novel-sized paragraphs.  From morning until night…chatter, chatter, chatter.  It was a nickname I deserved.

Unfortunately, those early Tuesdays with God bore strong witness to that nickname.  My second Tuesday of modified obedience found me back at the dining room table, pink pen in hand, announcing to God, “Well, I’m back for Tuesday #2!”  Was I counting down until they could be over?  It seemed that way.  For three rather lengthy paragraphs following that sentence, I launched into an enthusiastic discussion of what I’d learned at Bible Study the night before.  I didn’t stop to ask what I was to pray about, I didn’t ask God if there were things I needed to learn, I didn’t wait quietly…I just started yammering. 

Chatter, chatter, chatter I did…informing God of my needs whenever He saw fit to marry me off (our Bible study topic the night before had centered on intimacy), the merits of what an incredibly easy-going date I would be, should He happen to find someone to date me, and concluding with a halfway heartfelt request to receive the perfect husband and for me to be able to fulfill him in every way once we found each other.

After my whirlwind information session, I clapped the journal shut, put away the pink pen, and drove merrily back to work, grateful to have set God straight on all topics important to my impending marriage to someone in the great wide world. 

The third week, I spent journaling about my struggle with a man I’d fought attraction to for months – he was not available at that time, and I knew my growing infatuation with him had to be curbed, but it seemed each time I saw him, he did something nice that tugged at my heartstrings.  And just minutes into the lunch hour, after blabbering on about my sorrows and woes in this world of forbidden attraction, a friend of mine called.  She was in the area – could she stop by and see me?  I welcomed her presence and discarded my prayers, leaving God behind in a whirlwind of forbidden thoughts and “better offers.” 

And then came a week of vacation…so of course I skipped meeting God in lieu of all my pressing plans…and then I forgot…and then I fell asleep…

And before long, my modified, mostly disobedient lunch dates with God were nonexistent.  I was back to eating out with my friends on Tuesdays.  The prayer chapel had never seen my face.  Whatever words God had for me never got to my ears. 

Several weeks later, my accountability partner asked me if I was still doing Tuesday lunches with God, and I just waved her aside with some excuse as to why it hadn’t worked out. 

Weeks turned into months and I assumed God had chalked the experience up to as much of a failure as I had made it.  I did not figure I would hear of the Tuesday lunch assignment again.  And I credited my failure to make it work as the reason I was still single – still dateless in fact.  Perhaps I was incapable of relationship. 

But I had no idea that God was just beginning a great work.