I have Fridays off since I work a lot on the weekends. One of my favorite things to do on Friday afternoons is go to the movies by myself. I love getting caught up in the story on the screen and completely turning my mind off from reality…and then walking outside to find I still have the rest of the day free!
So today, knowing I won’t have a day off for awhile, I indulged myself by going to a $5 movie (the first show of the day is $5!!). As I got comfortable in my seat and ate most of my popcorn before the movie even started, I prepared to be swept up in the lives of made up people. But first, the previews. The previews are one of my favorite parts of movies–sometimes I get so excited about one of them that I forget what movie I’m actually there to see and am disappointed when I remember.
Today I saw previews for movies that made me laugh, made me look forward to knowing the characters’ stories, made me look for the release date to know how long I’d have to wait. And when will they be released? Fall 2008. Suddenly it hit me that I won’t see any of these movies, at least not when they’re released. I’ll be in some yet to be decided country, potentially on the other side of the world, surrounded by people who have never even seen a movie. And for a moment, I was a little disappointed.
Now, don’t get me wrong, I have no doubt that this is exactly where the Lord wants me to spend this next year. And I know what the Lord has planned will be completely fulfilling…I doubt I will spend much time (maybe a little 🙂 missing the new releases from home. But as I prepare to go, I find more and more things that I know I’m leaving behind. Every time I take a hot shower I know I have one less to enjoy before I go. Each time I hop in my car to drive wherever I want to go, I remind myself not to take that convenience for granted. When I find myself alone in my house surrounded by quiet, I pause to soak it in, knowing how scarce those moments will be once I leave. I want to enjoy those conveniences while I can, but I also want to be prepared (and even excited) to live without them.
It strikes me how many “things” I will be stripped of this year. And while those will be sacrifices in one sense, they are nothing compared to the other things I am preparing to leave behind. My pride–to be stripped of this so completely that there is no root left. My sense of entitlement–the way this is so much a part of me that I don’t even realize it is there. Competitiveness, judgments, needing to be right. While I want to enjoy warm showers and quiet moments as long as I can before I head out, I don’t want to wait to leave to start letting go of these things. I don’t want to hold onto them until the last minute or believe that I have to travel around the world in order for the Lord to break me of these habits. I want to begin surrendering them even now, believing that the Lord will take them and replace them with things so much greater. With humility. With compassion. With unity. I have no doubt that this will be painful–far more so than a cold shower! But I also have no doubt that the fruit will be so much sweeter.
