An Interesting Thing Happened Today...

An interesting thing happened while I was at church today, two things actually.

The first, I was paying my tithing – which in and of itself isn’t interesting but what happened was. I’d gotten behind in paying it and was trying to catch up from the summer. Everything from the summer and thus far this semester needed to be tithed – a surprisingly large amount of money. I’d written a check for the first half – which was kind of painful but at the same time not.

It was painful because it was a huge amount of money all at the same time but not because I have a weird relationship with money - I know I need it, I know I don’t have enough of it but when I have it, it’s like “whatever” and it doesn’t mean much to me, there’s a disconnect between us.

Today I paid the second half – I went by the bank the other day to pick up the cash, I didn’t want to pay it in 20’s because while it would have been funny, the executive secretary or whoever counts tithing would’ve hated me. I tripled checked it on the way to my car and the thought “I could do some many other things with this money” briefly crossed my mind followed by “no I can’t” and that was the end of that.

It sat on my shelf for two days and this morning I wrote my tithing slip, put it in, sealed the envelope and handed it to the bishop. I felt so relieved afterwards, like I didn’t have to worry about it anymore – God and I were square again, at least in this regard. But I also realized that I didn’t want to keep the money, it wasn’t mine to keep it was the Lord’s not mine.

The other thing happened in Relief Society/Priesthood – the bishop was teaching because it was the fifth Sunday and he was talking about the evils of pornography and how the Lord can help you overcome these urges through intense prayer and fasting. It wasn’t about that but it reminded me about something that happened a couple of weeks ago.

I’d been having these really weird irrational urges at work and I was getting rather worried. Every morning I top the bagels with cheese and put them in the oven, well a couple minutes later I have to retrieve them. I noticed that when I would reach my hands into the oven to retrieve them the irrational urge to flick my wrists up and touch the hot oven would nearly overpower me – it was getting harder and harder to resist. It would hurt a lot, I would probably scream and it would leave behind a massive burn – bigger and worse than all my other ones from the bakery have been.

I wouldn’t do it because I enjoy pain or like getting hurt, to the contrary, I don’t. The burns are mine to keep regardless, I can’t get rid of them, I don’t like them but I have to live with them for the rest of my life.

I think it’s because I know I shouldn’t and that’s what’s making it so tantalizing. I think this is in relation to how much sleep I’m going on. The last two semesters I have had some pretty odd irrational urges that I thankfully I have kept at bay but it was all I could do to stop myself from doing it.

I was getting a little worried about myself and said another prayer before work asking God to help me keep these irrational urges at bay and to ignore them, I didn’t want my thoughts to become my actions, and I told the bakers. They looked at me a little weirdly but I’ve noticed that since I’ve told them the urge to flick my wrists while they’re in the oven has all but evaporated.

I figured out why a little bit ago – subconsciously I feel like they’re watching me now and making sure I don’t do anything stupid. I’m sure they’re not but that’s how I feel. If I were to do it now, I’d have to be so much sneakier about it. In an odd way, it’s actually been a good thing because it protects me from damaging myself; any damages that do come will truly be an accident.

The point is – if God can help me overcome irrational urges to inflict damage on myself, He can help you, me, us get through anything.