It's Never Too Late

I finally found myself a good strong, sinewy argument to make against the concept of "quiet times." This morning I woke up rested, greeted the day with hope and in the cool gray I sped off to work. After being at work a while, I decided to go to the restroom, where I did some good thinking. (If you can't admit doing some good thinking in the restroom, you're repressed and you need to build a bridge and get over it. I can admit it, and my stock doesn't go down because of it.) So, while in the restroom, the negative church ladies in my head started shaking their fingers at me and saying, "You rushed off toward your day, without a second to pray." (I think this may be some schmaltzy awful Christian saying I heard once. I think I'm quoting it wrong.) It's not that anything was particularly wrong, I just all of a sudden started to feel this certain guilt that nothing would go right because I hadn't prayed. And let's check the scoreboard here:

# of times I have done a "quiet time" in the morning EVER: zero
# of times I can directly relate this to the disasters that occurred in the course of the day: also zero

And in the midst of the church ladies beginning to argue with each other about why and when I should pray next (why? to ask for forgiveness for not praying before work. when? I should leave work, drive directly to a monastery and get on my knees on top of some thick gravel and stay there for at least 3 hours. ) So in the midst of their arguing, the still small voice of Jesus came through and said, "Wait, it's never too late." "You can pray right now, right here in the bathroom. I don't need your hour when you wake up anymore than I want you in the bathroom. In the oddest and most difficult times, that's where I am. When you are freaking out, when your head is pounding in pain, when you want to cry. That's when I want you to call to me. We are in love, and what is our love if you won't tell me what's wrong and let me kiss it and make it better. It's never too late because I am in the bathroom. I am with you and thinking of you wherever you go. And you're a little pipsqueak human, so you can't think of me all the time, you just don't have that capacity, but I am always thinking of you. My attention is so fully on you all the time. And all I want is for you to look up once in a while and tell me in your own words what's going on. So I will know that you know that I am here listening and watching. I listen and watch with love, all the time."

"No matter how long it's been, I've been watching and listening the whole time. And it's never too late to talk to me. I'm here. Now and forever."

Really. He said all that. In the bathroom. At like 9:42am or something. Our God really is awesome.