Broken Record Truth

A few weeks ago, I plowed through Psalm 119. It took a few days, and by the end, my snarky self was convinced that the psalmist had an alternate identity as a broken record.  Seriously: 176 verses of the same thing over and over again. Evidently the psalmist didn't consider conciseness to be a virtue worth having.

But then, I realized that the psalmist is doing exactly what I have to force myself to do all day long: preaching the truth to himself. Our world is antagonistic to truth. Our hearts are as well. And so if we want to walk in truth, which is the only way to peace, we have to remind ourselves of it over and over again.

Sometimes this gets repetitive. I remind myself minute by minute that not only does what I do matter, but how I do it matters too. I remember that Christ is with me, Emmanuel. I hold before myself the suffering Christ and then the hope of the resurrection. I tell myself that being present is more important than being productive. I repeat truth to myself like it's a paying job that can provide for my expensive book habit. All day. Every day. And sometimes it gets tiring. Okay, often it gets tiring.

At the close of the day, I am tired of reminding myself of what is Real and just want to wallow instead in what is easy for a little while, knowing that the next morning and the battle to believe truth will come quickly. But here is my joyful realization for the week: this is why God gives us the Church. Because when we are the Church for each other, we know that others are walking alongside us fighting the same fight, struggling to remind themselves of truth as well. We are not alone in our fight to live in the hard truths instead of easy numbness.

Simultaneously, when we are part of the Church, there are moments of reprieve when someone else can speak truth into our lives for a bit. This is one of the reasons why Sunday morning church is so important to me: because for just an hour and a half every Sunday, I get to just listen as someone else reminds me gently of what I have to forcibly fight for the rest of the week. This is an incredible gift.

If you are someone like me who struggles to remember what is real, I hope you find others who can help you remember. I also hope you try memorizing Scripture with your children so that then the inner voice repeating it to you throughout the day has a really cute voice. Most of all, I hope you don't beat yourself up over the off days but just keep trying to jump back on the broken record band wagon of truth. It might make for a ridiculously long Psalm, but it also makes for a richer life.