I have so far to go

I've been on kind of a binge lately, a spiritual binge, reading and listening to anything I could get my hands on. I'm reading The Imitation of Christ, The Confessions of St. Augustine, and Surprised by Truth edited by Patrick Madrid. I also got a new MP3 player and downloaded a whole bunch of stuff from Lighthouse Catholic Media . One that I just listened to and really enjoyed is Father Larry Richards' "The Truth". Wow! That one is amazing. It really made me think about my relationship with Jesus and I realized, you know, sometimes it's great, but then there are other times when it's more like I am in His fan club, reading about Him, talking about Him, studying Him, but not really knowing Him. I mean, it's good to do those things, but then we should use those to grow closer to Him, through daily prayer. Fr. Richards is very inspiring in that, drawing from his own journey with Christ and sharing his wonderful insights, especially those he has gathered from working with young people. I really highly recommend this talk.

Reading and listening to all of this I have, of course, been working on my own relationship with Christ, trying to draw closer to Him and make it better. And I was feeling pretty satisfied with it, like I was doing pretty good, then I got to this passage just tonight in Surprised By Truth. This is from the conversion story of Paul Thigpen, the first story in the book:

"Two months later I was sitting alone in our Presbyterian church's sanctuary,
late in the evening after a service had ended. I'd opened up my Bible to the
book of Acts....and I thought about the day of Pentecost. I'd never been taught
about the baptism of the Holy Spirit or his gifts. But I told God that if what
happened to those first believers on that day long ago could happen to me this
evening, I wanted it. And I was willing to sit there all night until it
happened"

I am ashamed to say that my first reaction to reading that was, "whoa! I would never ask for that, because then it would mean I'd have to go get up and do something!" Oh, the Lord is so patient with me and I have so far to come!! I don't want that to be my first reaction, but it truly was. I mean, after Pentecost the Apostles had to get up and leave their homeland and head out into eventual martyrdom! That's tough stuff.

So I have a lot of work to do. But I am really enjoying all of the reading and listening. I will try and share some more of my reactions and thoughts as I go. If anyone has read any of these books and wants to discuss let me know. It gives a greater understanding, I think, when you can bounce stuff off of others.