the drought

I have stayed away from writing "reflections" for quite awhile. But I have a good alibi. I experienced another "spiritual drought" again. That's my alibi.

By saying that... I can hear my mom saying - "I told you, no excuses!". But "bless her soul" I can't think of anything to say to explain my being irresponsible. I have promised myself that this year, I will make my daily personal reflection on the scriptures. I did it for a couple of weeks straight then... I stopped. And I have not written until now.

This happened many times in the past for me. I also wrote a lot of reflections before when I was still new in the apostolate. My heart then was burning with so much inspiration that time and my ideas were running like a river. And once I finished reading the scripture and sat in front of the computer... I am stoppable. I was like Jesus' disciples, blessed with the wisdom of the Holy Spirit.

But then, after awhile, the fire died down. I lost the inspiration. It became hard for me to think and construct a simple sentence to make a short reflection. Until, I totally stopped all together.

My spiritual adviser call it "spiritual drought". Where the burning desire in one's heart suddenly died down. "Back-sliding" is another term that he used to describe it. When one feels that the grace of the Holy Spirit is not working anymore and the person goes back to its wrong ways. But then, according to him, this is not a bad thing at all. This is in fact, a blessing if we have to look it in a different context.

Spiritual drought is a life's trial. He explained it to me in a simile. He said... our spiritual life is like a tree. It needs sun, air and water to grow. These are our life's achievements, family, friends and other blessings that we received from God. But then, God also gives the tree a period of drought. Too much sun but less water or sometimes, totally no water. And when that happens, the tree never dies. Its roots sink deeper to the soil to find water in order to survive. The roots grow deeper and deeper not knowing that by doing so, the tree becomes stonger and deeply anchored. And then, the big hurricane came, everything was destroyed, the houses, the vegetations, everything except the tree. It remained planted and standing strong because the roots were deep enough to hold the trunk of the tree on the ground. It survived the hurricane because of the drought.

I was called a  splogger by another blogger in another website. And that broke my spirit. So I stopped writing. But like any drought. And after awhile, it made me more thirsty. I thirst to write again. That is why I am here again and writing those nagging thoughts. And yes, soon I will be doing my "reflections" again.

The hurricane had subsided. The storm is now calm. The tree remained standing. And I am thirsty.