Boredom

“But perhaps God is strong enough to exult in monotony.” -GK Chesterton

Blogging is difficult these days because I find that have become boring. Not that I find that a bad thing. Boring is peaceful. Boring is the result of tasting what the author of Hebrews called “entering the rest.” Boring is drinking the same cup of coffee and praying the same prayers in the morning before Anne stirs. Boring is hearing the Canadian geese honking over the house at 7:14 AM, every day. Nevertheless, it is hard to communicate when one is boring. I have no great revelations or 6 steps to a deeper walk with God. There is nothing exciting or even disconcerting in me right now.

Boring, by the way, is not the result of getting older. “Older” simply means settling down into what I knew in the beginning before I discovered passion and excitement. It is the essence of what youth would be if youth were stable. I know that the ups and downs of amplitude waves, when averaged out, produce a straight line. It’s that line beginning in youth that is the sum of our lives, the thing that holds it all together, or in my case, since I am a Christian, the Person who holds it all together.

The Song of Songs is the story of the beloved learning to trust her lover. In the beginning she sums up her love like this: “My beloved is mine, and I am his.” Her place in the relationship comes first. She could have easily written a book on “how to make your man stay at home.” After several cycles of embraces and separations, she utters one of the most beautiful confessions in the Bible: “I am my beloved’s, and his desire is toward me.” He is all. She is at peace in the security of his love. The book ends with the pair going out, arm in arm, to see if the vineyards are ready for harvest. That, my friends, is boring.

Here are some boring things I have rediscovered. First, the whole of Christianity can be summed up in the phrase, “Repent, and believe the gospel.” Simply put, (1) I am not God; (2) He is.

Second, God without my permission has given me four things that are essential to my well-being. They are not my doing; they are his gifts. The New Testament church found them after Pentecost, lying at their feet, tenderly wrapped and addressed to them. They are (1) the preached word, which I need because I forget the truth at least weekly; (2) the Lord’s Supper, the visible word, a pledge of Christ’s sacrifice and of his union with me; (3) fellowship with other believers, whose gifts complement mine, and whose perceptions correct my warped ones; (4) prayer, both corporate and personal.

My suspicion is that these things are boring. They are not exhilarating, relevant, subjective, moralistic, individualistic, and contain no clue as to which current presidential candidate will usher in the Second Coming. They are repetitive, like eating.

(At this point I lost my thread of thought, and began to stare out the window, munching on cheese crackers and thinking about whether or not to weed the fescue in my Bermuda grass, or just hope it’s all the same color green eventually. I’m remembering people I have loved and still love, thinking I may go sit next to Anne on the couch and fall asleep. It’s quiet in the house. May the Lord bless us and Bore us all to Death.)