A Chapel A Day- Day 9 (Running on Empty)

Pushing the speed limit on the interstate as I raced to yet another appointment, I was caught off guard one hot summer day last year when my car sputtered and hesitated. I pushed the gas pedal harder. The car sputtered, hesitated...and died. Just like that. I looked at the fuel gauge.  You guessed it. Empty.

Suddenly, I was going nowhere fast.

Day 9 of this Lenten Chapel A Day blog series finds me considering my fuel tank. Not the one that propels my car... the one that keeps me going day in and day out--emotionally, physically and spiritually.

I recently heard a minister's take on what he called our high RPM lifestyle...racing from here to there, one appointment, errand or responsibility to the next. Too often, he said, we don't realize that our inner tank is getting dangerously close to empty. 

I am teetering toward the "E" in my fuel tank as I find myself on Day 9 is the sanctuary of Gulf Breeze United Methodist Church. It's a beautiful building. It is peaceful and quiet, much like the community in which is sits. It is the perfect place to sit quietly on the back pew with my Bible, devotional and notepad. It is the perfect place to consider how best to refuel my inner tank so I can get back on Life's road.

You may think that I'm about to tell you that the hour of time spent praying, reading... and listening.. left me feeling filled up and ready to race back onto Life's highway, screaming "Look out, world, here I come again!"

It didn't.

In fact, today's chapel time made me realize that I need to consider moving a little more slowly through each day. I need to move with more focus, more purpose and more dependence on God's fuel instead of my own. I can make out a daily schedule-- that's a good thing! But, it needs to be a schedule filtered through what He wants to get done that day--- not me. And, it needs to be done on His time, not mine. And, it needs to be accomplished with His strength (fuel) not mine.

There are a lot of places I could have gone for a fill-up today. I could have looked out around me: to other people, to activities, to food or drink. But, instead, as part of my Lenten journey of discipline, I purposed to look not OUT... but UP. 

Because when it comes to my spiritual fuel tank--- I never want to find myself going nowhere fast.