Expectations

Lately the Lord has been teaching me a lot about having expectations, and I wanted to share some of it with all of you, my friends :)

So, as I've mentioned, I live in a house with 6 other women, so there are 7 of us total. Six of the seven are full time students, most of us have a part time job, and we're seeking to live authentic Christian lives. Awesome. Therefore, Monday through Thursday we rise before the sun in order to pray. We pray the liturgy of the hours Morning Prayer, read more about it here. To start off the semester we rose by 6:10 and gathered at our kitchen table for "breakfast", most eat, some of us sit there and stare. Then at 6:30 we head to our prayer room and do this prayer. However, one of our sisters had a schedule change, requiring an even earlier start to her day. In order to be able to include this sister in morning prayer we decided to make a sacrifice by starting morning prayer at 6 am. So we all wake up and head upstairs to our prayer room from our beds (aside from a few) and prayer morning prayer.

I had been to morning prayer last year, prior to living in household, and the beginning of this year we had been having morning prayer where we sounded beautiful, there were few errors, and morning prayer was truly an uplifting way to start my day. Morning prayer met the expectation I held. Then on the mornings that we pray at 6 am we kept messing up. Antiphons were said wrong, or forgotten to be said, we sang the psalms incorrectly, our voices didn't sound so pretty, the list goes on. And basically I didn't feel like morning prayer was worth it. I wasn't getting anything out of it, other than frustration, because it wasn't meeting my expectations. Morning prayer was not what I thought it should be.

This was really bothering me so I talked to a friend about it. I just didn't know what to do. I was frustrated because morning prayer was making me feel frustrated. I was frustrated because morning prayer didn't sound pretty. I was frustrated because I didn't like getting up 20 mins earlier. The list goes on with all these things that upset me because it wasn't how I thought it should be.

This was how I was feeling and then I talked to my friend who said Christ is pleased with the time we are giving him. He is pleased that we are making the effort.
I was upset because these various things were an inconvenience to me, and they didn't meet my own expectations, but all I did was think of myself. I didn't think about how God is pleased that we are giving our time, that we are making an effort, that we are striving to love. I didn't think about how this prayer was giving strength to our sister. I didn't think about how this sister had to get up earlier too in order to get ready for her day.

By our human imperfection we will continue to have expectations, now as I think about this, I realize how many different expectations I have about things. It's almost as if I have my own will, and I get upset when God reveals to me that he has something better. In addition, when little things bother or upset us they are the perfect opportunity to offer them as a gift to Jesus. Our God can take the tiniest offerings and do great things for them. This is something I will have to continually work on, for the rest of my life. I invite you to join me on this journey - this journey of letting go of our expectations for things, and allowing God to be God. Permitting our King to be King.

"He must increase; I must decrease." John 3:30

"If he gives his life as an offering for sin,
he shall see his descendants in a long life,
and the will of the LORD shall be accomplished through him.
Because of his affliction
he shall see the light in fullness of days;
through his suffering, my servant shall justify many,
and their guilt he shall bear." -Isaiah 53:10-11

So let us confidently approach the throne of grace
to receive mercy and to find grace for timely help. -Hebrews 4:16