Sunday, January 22, 2012

Ants in my pants

I love the following verse where Peter was speaking to wives:

“You should clothe yourselves instead with the beauty that comes from within, the unfading beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which is so precious to God.”  (1 Peter 3:4)  

I notice this thing about myself - when I have ants in my pants, I do not have a gentle and quiet spirit.  When I have ants in my pants, my face breaks out and I am pretty sure I make those around me uncomfortable or downright nervous.  Do you have any of those restless friends who are always goofing with their phones, or tidying around the house, or shifting conversations quickly from one topic to the next?  Do they put you at ease or make you a nervous wreck right along with them?  On the contrary, do you have friends who amidst all the chaos remain gentle and calm?  These friends seem to draw you to them.  They make you feel comfortable.  Their beauty comes from the inside out.  My dear friend, Dawn, is the latter.  She has four beautiful children (3 of which are very active boys), and she always seems so cool, calm, and collected.  She puts me at ease with just the tone of her voice and her gentle spirit.  Dawn doesn’t adorn herself with fancy hairstyles or lavish jewelry and clothes, but she is one of the most beautiful women that I know simply because she clothes herself instead with the unfading beauty that comes from within of a gentle and quiet spirit.  She’s actually the whole package because she’s a bombshell on the outside too. 

Which woman are YOU?  Which woman do you want to be?  We pack our schedules with so many activities.  We work so hard to maintain the perfect house, raise perfect kids, be recognized in our careers, volunteer at church, volunteer at our kids’ schools, do fun stuff with our kids, visit mom, Facebook, etc. that we don’t even take time to be quiet.  Ever.  How do we expect to hear God when we are never quite enough to listen?  How are we supposed to teach this to our our daughters when we are not setting good examples in this area?  I wonder if this is more difficult for women than it is for men.  I heard some insane statistic once about women using three times as many words in a day as a man.  Maybe if we cut back a few words, we could find time to be quiet.  But then again, when we are quiet, men are the first to ask what’s wrong because we’re quiet.  Forget that idea.     

Speaking of being quiet, yesterday I deactivated my Facebook.  It’s been about 36 hours and I don’t miss it one bit.  Part of deactivating my FB is so that I have time to be quiet with God.

Anywho – where was I?  Oh, yes.  Being quiet.  See how I get sometimes?  Do you see how it can be so hard to be quiet when I have a bazillion things racing through my head.  And ix-nay on the oga-yay.  (Do you speak Pig Latin?)  (Is Pig Latin a proper noun that warrants capitalization?)  Yoga is NOT where I go to be quiet and reflective.  Un uh.  Nope.  Not my dealie whopper.  So how do we be quiet and gentle?  I think it starts with beginning each day with God in prayer.  Every morning I sit and drink half of a pot of coffee while I read my Bible and pray.  I don’t start my day hurried.   

Peter is telling us girls to develop an inner spirit of Godliness so that others can see Christ in us. 

How do you work on developing a quiet and gentle spirit?  Do you already have one?  Do you think it’s even possible these days?  Do you make people a nervous wreck? 

2 comments:

  1. Good food for thought Jen! I'm carving out quiet time for myself today!

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    1. I have thought of you so many times these past 2 weeks. I am praying like crazy for you and your family and all of the changes in your life. See you in 48 hours!

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