When I'm in a bad mood, most likely, I don't have any reason whatsoever to be so. I mean seriously, usually nothing bad has happened, no one has yelled at me or hurt my feelings in any way. I just so happen to be in a terrible mood.
This was the case last Thursday. I had a day off of school, so in the morning, I was pretty excited about having an unexpected sabbath that I hardly ever get to have, what with school work, afterschool band practice, keeping up relationships. And at first, it was fairly nice, just lazing around the house for the day.
But then, I got insanely bored. And Sarah does not deal well with boredom; I'm restless and full of energy without being able to think about what I want to do. I actually ended up crying out of frustration.
So there I was, laying on my bed upside down, crying out of boredom, frustration, confusion, and other feelings I don't even have words to describe. All through this little episode, I was trying to figure out why I was feeling so very bad, attempting to place comforting words into God's mouth that would make me feel better. But I ended up trying to comfort myself and figure out how joy worked and all of these hardcore issues, and that just made my brain go even more crazy. I was having a legit problem with "being still and knowing that he is God".
(Yes, I know, this post has been kind of whiny so far. But I promise, there is a point to this story!)
After several torturing minutes of all of these feelings and thoughts swirling around in my brain like a merry-go-round, God finally did speak to me. He said..."Go brush your teeth."
Okay, God, you are nuts! I'm trying to figure out some serious issue about trust and joy and thankfulness, and you're telling me to go brush my TEETH? At that point, however, I was so desperate to feel better that I just did what he told me to do.
Brush brush brush, breathe breathe breathe, be still still still. It was so easy to focus on those three simple tasks that my dizzying merry-go-round thoughts slowed down and gave me a break.
I'm pretty sure that I used some holy toothpaste (Crest with Scope Outlast for anyone who might be wondering), because God spoke right to me somewhere in the middle of all that. He said, "Sarah, you can't try to process everything yourself and figure it out logically, and then claim that I did it. You've got to shut up and listen to what I have to say. That's the only way that your words will be clean and pure, because MY words are clean and pure."
WHOA. You know that God is taking over your life when he gives you revelations over toothpaste.
Since this event of brushing teeth, I've been listening more and more to what God is saying instead of saying what I want to say. And you know what? Friday, Saturday, and today have been completely amazing. I am at peace about everything I have done throughout these three days, because I asked God first what I needed to do, and I did it with joyful, clean hands. He, and only he, has purifies the words of my mouth and the works of my hands. I couldn't be happier.
"Give us clean hands
Give us pure hearts
Let us not lift our souls to another
Oh, God, let us be
A generation that seeks
That seeks your face
Oh God of Jacob."
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