Poured Out

I know it's been a while since I've posted. Sorry, a lot going on. I've had this on my mind for a while and hopefully I've sharpened my thoughts rather than lost them. (For the record, I have no brain to speak of right now!)

I have felt lately as though I am spent. I know physically I am so falling apart in this pregnancy. I am definitely dragging there. But even beyond that, I have been spent in many areas of my life.

It made me contemplate that cheesy but true preacher illustration about the sponge that must be squeezed out or it will get moldy, or the one about the potter's cup that he fills up to pour out on other creations he is shaping on the potter's wheel. That clicked with me: I have been completely poured out.

But it's not as though I have been doing things in a formally organized ministry. I've just been poured out in everyday life: poured out to my friends, poured out in my family, poured out in potty training (almost literally--I can not tell you how many pans of soaking underwear I have poured out into the laundry).

So this leads me to the drink offering. I have never really understood it and it's place in the sacrifice process. I mean the meat that is offered makes sense because it is used to feed the priests. But the drink offering is simply poured out. Doesn't this seem like a waste?

Yes. I feel a lot of times like what I'm doing is a waste. I mean how many more buckets of underwear water will I pour out before I see results? What good am I when I have no clear answers to offer to those asking? Will I ever be able to say things just once and see immediate action? Will the things I spend hours on each day always be undone within minutes?

At least I know that even in the "waste" there is an offering.