I'm keeping my options open here, but it's slow going for sure. We're trudging across the grass, an afternoon walk to break up the four walls of our day. I'm asking her if she feels any different, spiritually, not physically. We've been fasting for three and a half weeks now, subsisting on fruits and vegetables. Every morning I gulp my smoothie and pinch my skin to see if anything's changed. It hasn't. I still feel dry inside, dehydrated, thirsty.

I prop an index card with a verse from Colossians on my desk at work, we read through 4 or 5 chapters of the Bible every morning, we've exhausted our playlist of tolerable Christian music sixty times over, and I'm hungry. I'm really hungry. But I still don't feel different. I wanted to feel different at this point.

The debate is ongoing while I type this, "Shouldn't our spiritual disciplines be private? Closeted practices that sharpen us on which we hinge our growth?" But honesty wins out: I'm not out to get brownie points from God (or you) here, trust me. I've finished with all that legalism stuff. But the truth is, like someone said to me the other day, the purpose of the (Lenten) fast is almost so we do fail, so that we can know that God is bigger, that He wins. That's consoling for a few minutes and in the big picture, but here on earth, that is not consoling in the least. I'm not really interested in long term benefits these days. I want action and I want feeling. And I want it now.

I need it now, I say to her, we're dipping down on the path at the edge of the field. I need to know that if I ask, He'll answer. That if I hold out my hands for bread, I'll at least be offered a saltine instead of a stone. I don't ask for a lot, I admit to her, at least not of God. I'm too accustomed to disappointment. It's safer to just not ask. But what has this past month been if not asking? What have the past few months been if not asking? Sure, I didn't use words until recently, but my heart hasn't changed. I'm asking. I'm asking for a lot right now. I'm asking for Him to show himself to me, to not pass me by, to heal me, to bless me, to give me a glimpse of His glory. I'm selfishly hording all the blessings I have so that I can stare at them when the doubt rises, to assure myself that My God Reigns.

I'm asking that He heals my knee. I smashed it six months ago and it's still swollen and tender. I'm sure surgery is in order, but I'm asking that it not be.
I'm asking that He pulls through financially. Things are tight. Always tight.
I'm asking that He restores some relationships I still don't understand the depths of.
I'm asking that He teaches me resistance and courage.
I'm asking that He heals my unbelief. My belief got wounded somewhere along the way, it needs to be healed completely.
I'm asking that He answers my prayers. Or at least nods in my general direction. That would do.