Can Do or Should Do?
Distant Shores Media/Sweet Publishing [CC-BY-SA-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)%5D, via Wikimedia Commons
The intense focus of Jesus’ prayer has created within him a clarity of purpose and conviction about what must be done and what must be left undone. This itself is not the purpose of prayer, but it is the fruit of a prayerful life (p 32)
There is so much I would love to do that I cannot do. My body says ‘no’! Illness, especially chronic illness makes you focus on what you can achieve, not what you might like to achieve. But perhaps it is a lesson for everyone. To focus on what we should do, not what we could do.
To do too much, or the wrong things is a temptation in the busyness that can be everyday life.
It is hard to say no, to ourselves as much as others. The wilderness is a place to work out those priorities. Perhaps as we pray, it will become clear. We will know what tasks are for us, and which are for us to leave.
37 And when they found him, they said, “Everyone is looking for you!”
38 Jesus replied, “We must go to the nearby towns, so that I can tell the good news to those people. This is why I have come.”
This year for Lent, I am reading Christ in the Wilderness by Bishop Stephen Cottrell, published by SPCK, reflecting on Stanley Spencer’s paintings of that title.
I’m not necessarily going to blog every day on it, just when something leaps out at me – and they will be thoughts rather than full blog posts
Pam's Perambulation 
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