When Reading is Too Much

I've recently developed quite the umm... 'over-fondness' for reading blogs. My recent bout of insomnia has definitely contributed here. I'm pretty sure it was at 3am one night that I discovered Haley's Halo, Sarah Bessey and the Pioneer Woman. In one fell swoop I was hooked.

I'm pretty sure I didn't bother to try and sleep after that.

My love for reading began at a very young age. I still have a distinct memory of piling all my favourite books around me (not one or 2 - piles people!). Who needed stuffed animals? Not me so long as Dr. Seuss was keeping me company. I was even such a smartie-pants that I was reading before kindergarten. I'm pretty sure it was impatience rather than aptitude that I was afforded that pleasure, I was just too impatient to wait until someone would read me a book - I went ahead and figured it out for myself (or Mom was just sick and tired of reading Stop That Ball over and over).

Now-a-days it still thrills me to pick up a new book, the smell of fresh ink and paper wafting as I open it for the first time... but now with a budget that lends itself a little more to home brew than Starbucks, the internet is a godsend. Here I can read about everything and anything, all for the cost of my internet connection.

Blogs are my internet porn.

There. I've said it.

What is troubling to me though is people. Especially Christians. A category I unashamedly (ok, sometimes they way people act, I'm a little ashamed) put myself in.

The way I think about God and His church has done a 180 over the years since Bible College. In fact, over time, I had become a bit of a skeptic. While attending a church (that I still love, but just can't be a part of anymore) that prides itself on scriptural knowledge over anything else... I began to see the world through a pretty narrow lens.

Falling in love with Jesus again is changing all that.

Letting go is changing all that.

What I read is changing all that.

This morning I was reading an exchange between people... Christians in particular, over a book review of Ann Voskamp's 1000 Gifts (which I just started reading and L-O-V-E). This man wrote a less-than-flattering review and Ann responded... not in kind, but by an invitation to his family to come over for dinner. He is stunned and writes a lovely blog apologizing... and then several of his 'supporters' blasted him for apologizing. The infighting began. On and on it went.

This is a common picture of the church today.

Fighting over who has it the most 'right.'

In the bickering and the squabbling, something gets lost.

And it's Jesus.

This year I believe God has been scaling away at the skepticism and replacing it with soft flesh. My heart has been broken... but He has been repairing it with a tender understanding and an unflinching realization that ALL IS GRACE.

So I think for a short while I'm going to go without reading blogs, unless they are the blogs of someone I know.

Oh who am I kidding?

I'll still read, knowing that the one who came to save me, also died for
Mr & Mrs angryclosemindedeveryonemustthinklikemeorthey'renotachristian.com.

Or maybe I'll just skip the comments.