Banquet banner, part 2

Last night, I blogged about God's banqueting table/hall/house. Tonight, I'm going to blog about how I think there are times when God's banqueting table/hall/house -- and its banner, delicacies, and delights -- can be taken for granted or even abused. I'm also going to touch on a few things that I blogged about when I bought a new keyboard earlier this year. I apologize in advance if I'm boring you with the same ol' story, but I hope to spice up my story with a few details that may be new to you. And I hope you're not tired of reading about my cats because, well, who else do I have readily available to write about? Well, there's God my Daddy. He totally rocks, and thinking about Him and talking about Him could totally distract me from anything, because He's the coolest Person in the universe ever. Wait. What was I talking about?

"For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them." (Ephesians 2:10)

At the beginning of this post, you saw a photo of Macho eagerly anticipating his evening snacky. I knew exactly how to snap a photo of him. I knew exactly where to sit so that he could come find me to satisfy his tummy-hunger. Voilà.

I love Macho, but my relationship with him is much different than my relationship with Choochie. Have I ever told you about the evening when I first met her? I brought her home with me as a kitten. She was given to me free by a family that didn't have enough money to declaw her, and they didn't want her to continue scratching their toddler, and they possibly just didn't want her anymore. I was told that she was very sweet and wanted to snuggle with her owner, who made her sleep outside at night. (Thanks. Now I get to deal with curbing her tendency to roam.) So, when I adopted her as a kitten, I wanted her to sleep in my bed at night. That first night I turned out the lights, snuggled into bed, and insisted that my little kitten slumber there with me, she stared at me for a minute and purred loudly with this look on her face that beamed even in the dark: "OH, MY GOSH, YOU'RE LETTING ME SLEEP HERE WITH YOU?!??" And from that point on, that's been her usual sleeping spot at night: in my bed, often perching on my shoulder, sometimes on my pillow, on occasion waking me up in the middle of the night with her too-close snuggling/purring. That's my baby. She knows that I'm the one who feeds her and gives her shelter, but I think she's ultimately motivated by having a close relationship with me. And I've already typed up most of this blog post with her purring at my living-room banqueting table. Voilà.

Macho, on the other hand, seems to have quite different motivations. He follows me around and demands my attention usually whenever he needs something: affection, food, or warmth. I didn't own him when he was a kitten; Choochie and I took him in when he was already about 2 years old, he didn't fit into his owner's life anymore, and he had already adopted me as his mama. But despite our history, it sort of grieves me sometimes that he'd rather have a snacky than a purring session with Mama. (I know... he's a cat. But please work with me here with my metaphor.)

Choochie seeks me, cries out for me, and demands to snuggle with me pretty much all year long. She's consistent, she's faithful, and she doesn't seem to care about how unpopular it is for cats to bond that closely with their owners. And usually when she misbehaves, she has the decency to do it right in front of my face. I correct her right away, and we move on with our lives. Macho, on the other hand, is a giant bully who sneaks around to misbehave when I'm not looking. Just a few minutes ago, he jumped onto my banqueting table, where there wasn't enough room for him, Choochie, and my computer simultaneously, so he was about to start bullying Choochie off the table, as usual. I decided to set a boundary, tell him that there wasn't any room for him, and shoo him off the table so that Choochie could remain here snuggling close to me. I love each of my cats equally, but if I have one that wants to be close to me and another one that only wants snackies, sorry, but I'm going to give the one who's after my heart as much snuggle time as possible... while feeding them both their snackies when it's time... and yes, I know that they're cats.

Referring back to that verse in Ephesians I quoted above, I'd also like to talk a bit more about having responsibilities in God's banqueting house. One major downside to living life in a spiritually abusive environment is that your calling could get squelched out completely, and you may not even realize it.

For pretty much most of my life, until recently, the people around me were always very "Meh" about music, as if it's something that everybody's automatically supposed to know about. The paternal figure of the household where I grew up had perfect pitch, so he would rarely spend more than an hour per week practicing music on his own before leading the music at church. So, musical discipline wasn't modeled very well for me. After I went off to college, almost everybody and their grandma knew how to lead church music on a guitar. (Which is one reason why I resisted learning how to play the guitar myself. Why conform?) Most of the regular pastors were musical, knew how to lead worship on a guitar, and had written at least one original worship song. Finding somebody who knew how to lead worship for a small group was rarely a problem, because almost everybody and their grandma was equipped and ready to go. And in those circles, answering God's call to be a missionary in a foreign country was placed on a pedestal, so that was almost everybody's goal. So, a musical calling wasn't considered to be very special.

So, after I left all those unhealthy environments, took a closer look at my soul, took a closer look at my hands, took a closer look at my brain, and took a step back, God was basically like, "Yes, hello. Of course you have a major calling on your life for music." It's kind of a no-brainer, especially considering the fact that I'd go to sleep at night when I was a teenager with piano chords in my head, I'd spend most of my evenings worshiping God on my guitar and trying to sing original songs to Him when I was in my early 20s, I minored in music when I was in college, I'm right-brained, I study my musical forefathers on YouTube in my spare time, and I usually have an easier time singing than I do talking. No-brainer.

I'm definitely not perfect, I'm definitely not the most diligent or disciplined person in the world, I definitely have a ton to learn, and I definitely have a lot of work ahead of me. But I kinda think God set me up. I'm a member of a church that is a major distributor of praise/worship music. Major music artists are on staff at my church as pastors. A while back, while I was singing in my church's choir, I noticed that one of the music-artist worship pastors (whose cds I bought long before she came on staff) was on the platform with us. I was starstruck, in an almost unhealthy hero-worship kind of way, and I had to talk to God my Daddy about it. He was like, "Happy birthday," even though it wasn't my birthday. That's what He's like. He's an extravagant giver of gifts. He's the Father of Lights, and He doesn't change, even though I deserve for Him to kick me out of the Family forever. Nope. He draws me closer, gives me something majorly awesome, and says, "Merry Christmas," even though it isn't Christmas yet.

And I think God is more interested in me fulfilling His calling on my life than I am. No-brainer.

And, of course, He wants that with everybody. Reader, you have an exquisitely unique calling on your life that Daddy longs for you to discover, cultivate, and pursue, if you haven't been discovering, cultivating, or pursuing it already.

God's banqueting table/hall/house is supersaturated with delicacies and delights, and His love-banner is huge and strewn across everything as a silently trumpeting reminder of who He is. But even though He delights in us enjoying His banquet, or in drinking deeply from His river, or in thoroughly using His gifts, I think the best thing is getting to know the Host of the banquet, the Giver of the gifts, the Owner of the table, the banner, and the entire house. His stuff is a lot of fun to play with. His stuff is needed. He wants us to use His stuff. But I don't think He wants us to use His stuff to make ourselves look good. He wants us to get to know Him. He wants us to worship Him. Knowing Him is better than getting His stuff. Finding Him is better than finding His stuff.

And, of course, after I fed the cats their evening snackies, Macho napped in another room while Choochie remained close to me. She is currently about 14 inches away from me while I type this. Yeah, that's right. She knows where she belongs.