This is the second post on Mathew Woodley’s Holy Fools. You can find the first one HERE.
It is a rare thing to read a piece of a book that feels like you could have written it. That is exactly how I felt when I read this by Woodley. I have no doubt it probably describes many of your nights at home as well.
“I finally arrive at home after a grueling day and a three hour committee meeting. As I enter the hallway, I realize that I never edited my son’s paper on the solar system and nobody organized the 21 pairs of shoes in our front hallway, and in my aggravation I snap at my wife before she falls asleep…As I sit in a comfortable chair with the remote nestled in my right hand, I watch Jerry Seinfeld dump his giftfriend because she separates her peas and eats them one at a time. Then I surf the Letterman show, where ‘Betty’ performs a ‘stupid human trick’ by snorting milk up her nose and then shooting it out her tear duct. Before I head to the kitchen, I flip to an infomercial where Jim explains how a hair transplant revived his sagging self-esteem.
I turn off the television but by now a bunch of monkey-thoughts have invaded my heart, screeching and swinging from the branches in my tangled neurons, pelting me with mental bananas. They are out of control, and I’m seriously distracted and agitated. So I walk into the kitchen, make a cup of hot tea, sit in my chair, and grab the last thing I want right now-my Bible. My body shrieks with internal noise, but as I hold the hot tea in my hand, allowing it to steam and steep, it suddenly occurs to me that the house is quiet. All day long a vicious conspiracy of noise has inundated me. The silence feels strange but good and even sweet.
My mind continues to churn, but I am starting to feel that leather Bible cover in my hands and the movement of my lungs as I breathe. I smell the cinnamon in my hot tea. It strikes me that although I’ve talked about God and done things for God today, I haven’t remained with God. And then the thought occurs to me: God is here and I am in his presence. God has been seeking me. This is infinitely better than Berry’s stupid human tricks and Jim’s hair restoration.” (emphasis mine)
