Sunday, August 22, 2010

Sunday Morning Coffee

This morning,like every Sunday Morning that I do not work,my day started with getting out of bed,gathering together what I was planning on wearing to church,then heading downstairs to have a cup of coffee.
This is my wake up call.
Coffee helps to settles me into my morning ahead,giving me a warm feeling all over.
Since I am the only one in my house who drinks a morning cup,I usually make something instant to save on dirtying extra dishes.
While putting the freeze dried coffee crystals and sugar into my cup a word popped into my head "control".
Suddenly this strong need came over me to just throw the ingredients in my cup away.
This all seemed rather silly,at first and after several seconds of arguing with myself,I decided to pour it down the sink.
As my husband and I got into the car,panic started to fill my head."Great what am I going to do I'm sure to get a terrible headache with out my first cup of caffeine,how will I function?"
As we continued on our way my stomach began to grumble from hunger and I started to feel really ill.
Thinking I don't know why I just didn't have that cup and be done with it,but also knowing in my heart this was no plain suggestion but a call to follow through.
I tried to keep my inner grumbling quit and focus on the task at hand,attending church.
Once in the pew I kept getting these intermittent moments of nausea followed by a feeling of almost dizziness,like I would fall over if the pew in front of me was not there to hold on to.
Trying to not focus on my human weakness I continued to sing and listen to the Gospel reading and then the sermon,which by the way,was about "fasting".
As the service came to its culmination and we got ready to go up to receive communion I said to myself "God why did you not want me to not have that cup of coffee? What was the importance of all this?"
To which came the answer,or should I say question "If you were denied being with me would you feel as bad as you felt over one cup of coffee?
Wow talk about making a point!
I must admit the idea of missing Liturgy or prayers has never made we want to argue about the loss or feel physically ill.
Saying no to these things can sometimes seem almost easy,no guilt involved.
Has I went up for communion and saw the icon of Jesus I thanked him for opening my eyes to something very important.
Never in my life,before today,have I ever felt such real joy,to the point of wanting to smile and be grateful for the gifts being offered and given to me from that chalice.
Who would have thought that denying myself a cup of coffee would be such a revelation.
Maybe there is something to this whole fasting thing after all.

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