Revelation

The other day I had a revelation about consecration. Often in the Bible, especially in the Hebrew Bible, we see the word 'destruction' a lot. In particular as Israel was claiming their promised land. This 'destruction' was the type of destruction associated with consecrating something or someone fully to God, as an offering.

One morning during my fast last week (it ends tomorrow!) this popped into my head, mostly in relation to this period of fasting and consecration I've entered into. Anyone who's spent any length of time with me understands that I absolutely LOVE reading, and I don't handle hunger particularly well. Therefore, deleting all of my romance novels from my kindle app (even my favorite ones!) and voluntarily choosing to skip meals was very much a sort of destruction of myself. It was a sacrifice. But you see, I chose to do this, and this revelation coming to me was almost like a 'good job' from above, a sort of confirmation of my journey.

Suffering is part of the package when you choose to follow Christ, but I daresay that sounds worse than it actually is. Every sacrifice brings with it its reward. There comes a point where "suffering" takes on a different meaning.There are many accounts in the Bible and elsewhere, where people rejoice in trials, tribulations, and the like, and thank God that they were counted worthy of suffering for Jesus Christ.

I can't say I was jumping for joy all of last week, but I can say that I had some very special moments with the Lord. And definitely my relationship to food has changed. Today would definitely be the first time I was physically unable to finish a pizza. And the old adage, "There's always room for dessert", well that wasn't the case today. Half of my small cup of ice cream went down the drain. There are worse things, I suppose.

Well, today I've also gone to get my new/old phone fixed. I haven't had a smart phone since coming to Italy, but it hadn't been a problem until WhatsApp became the primary form of communication amongst essentially everyone I know. One of my small group members gave me his old iPhone 3 for my birthday, to remedy the issue. Very nice of him, except that it doesn't charge. I'm hoping that it's just a port problem, and that it will charge once that gets replaced. We shall see.

Either way, it's been quite a lovely sunny day! I'm definitely loving this weather!