In which words are found and I eat them...

Your words were found and I ate them,

And Your words became for me a joy and the delight of my heart;

For I have been called by Your name,

O Lord God of hosts.

~ Jeremiah 15:16

I recently completed the B90X challenge (though I fell just short of completing it in the 90 day goal). I actually am starting over in the hopes of making it this time.

The first time I went through this challenge, I confess I don't remember this verse in Jeremiah. At that point in the challenge, I was behind and pushing to get done on time...things fell through the cracks.

I was listening to James McDonald's Walk in the Word broadcast this morning and this verse stood up and shouted at me. Your words were found and I ate them...

More importantly, God's word became a joy and delight for Jeremiah. Now I don't know if you know this, but Jeremiah was known as the weeping prophet. His task was pretty much to warn Israel of its doomed path and weep over Jerusalem's fallen state. Not really a job I would ever covet. But God told him to do it. He wrote Lamentations as his addendum to the other doom and gloom prophecies in the first book.

There is hope in those pages, but you have to squint REALLY hard to see it.

All this to say, Jeremiah STILL found joy and delight in God's word. It was a comfort and sustenance for him as he carried out God's less-than-happy work.

I love that. I want that. I need that.

I will not by any means compare myself to Jeremiah. He had a job no one else wanted or appreciated.

Right now though, I am a wife and mother. And there are days when those jobs are far from glamorous - right up there with uncoveted and unappreciated. I still have the roles even when I am sick and tired and wanting to be off by myself somewhere where no one else can reach me. I do not lose the task God has set before me just because I say I quit...and I've only said those words in jest, so don't get your undies in a bundle.

I love motherhood. I love being a wife. Sometimes, I just love myself more. What I want more than ever is to love God and God's Word SO much, that loving myself doesn't even cross my mind. That my joy and delight with His word will make my task seem like the LEAST I can do to please Him.

I DO love God's Word. I still love me more. I long for the day when that is no longer true.