Pass the Coffee

Those first sips of coffee in the morning are a great and terrible thing. The taste first hits the tongue hidden in the heat of the coffee. It is magnificent as it makes itself known to me but it teases me because I can just have tiny bit before I begin to scald my mouth with it.

The first sips never satisfy. They just get me started on the best cup of coffee of the day, the one that helps me pry my eyes open and clears the fog of sleep out of my brain.

As the coffee in the cup cools, I can fill my mouth with more and more of the yummy goodness that starts my day.

That is when it is best, when it is just cool enough that I can take a decent amount from the cup to my palate without burning. The taste is bright and clear as it makes its way to my belly.

People that don’t like coffee don’t understand. People that don’t love coffee don’t get it. Coffee isn’t for everyone even though I am a little leery of those that don’t enjoy it. My wife doesn’t like it but after over thirty years, I suppose I can stop being leery of her. She still doesn’t understand me and my coffee.

I like for my bible study in the morning to be like my coffee. I expect it to be great and terrible. I want to sit down and read something that fills me with awe the more I ponder it. I want it to add a wonderful flavor to my day. I want it to awaken me to things I may not know and clear the fog out of my life.

I also want it to strike a little fear into my life. I want to be challenged to do something that scares me half to death. I don’t want it to kill more or burn me but I want to find something that I am afraid to take in all at once for fear that it is just too much, too hot, too demanding.

I want it to seek out the ways that I am set in and break them to smithereens. I want to feel the change, the fear of change, the challenge of change and stand on the edge and fall with nothing to catch me but the hands of the Almighty!

Life doesn’t have to simply repeat itself over and over again, day after day. It can flow and move and take me to new places that force me to grow. Even though my body may only be growing in ways that are not so good, my spirit is never confined by physical constraints. When I read God’s Word there are many, many things that I can allow God to transform in me that I have simply been too selfish and too scared to do up till now. I don’t have to look very hard to find them.

But if I read God’s Word simply to help me stay just as I am, well, then what’s the point?

I will always have the hope that God is taking me to a new place I have never been and never dreamed I could go. I couldn’t stand to think that I will be the same guy I am today for the rest of my life even if I only have another day to live. I’m grateful I am not who I was but I know that there is more to the story. God’s Word will write a new day today and however many tomorrow’s I have yet to see.

2 Peter 3:18 Rather, you must grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
All glory to him, both now and forever! Amen.

The thing about growing, or not growing, is that a lot of times I haven’t known I wasn’t growing. I was asleep in the light and never realized that I was being dragged away from the intimate relationship with God that is required to thrive in his presence.

If I step up to his word and take it in and it strikes a little fear inside me, not so much that I run in terror but enough that I know I am handling something that can burn a little, I know that I am alive and taking in the truth. The fog rolls out of my life and I can see clearly that I am growing.

Colossians 1:10 Then the way you live will always honor and please the Lord, and your lives will produce every kind of good fruit. All the while, you will grow as you learn to know God better and better.

I’ve often been too selfish or too cowardly to live in a way that will always honor and please the Lord. It is a scary commitment to read this verse and say, “I’m going to give in and give all so that God can make this out of my life.” It is even scarier to actually do it. But that is what growth is all about.

I think about all the energy I’ve wasted trying to live the same day over and over again, doing the same things, giving the same amount, holding the same things back and hoping somehow it turns out different next time. Then when I think about how little I have had to do to see a miraculous change in my life, I can see the only real choice to make.

Pass the coffee.