Stirring up and pouring out.

I had the lines of Tim Hughes' song running through my head this morning:
Stir it up in our hearts, Lord,
Stir it up in our hearts, a passion for your name.

And then I thought: stir up - and pour out. Just like cooking. Stir up the pot, cook everything together, then pour the food out to serve it.

I want to be stirred up and poured out. To be stirred up so that I have more of God in my daily life, to have more of Jesus bubbling up to the surface, to BE more like Jesus.

I'm in danger of overusing the phrase 'stirred up', but it resonates with me. By this stage of the term, I have usually become so over busy that I go down to 'minimum maintenance' mode. (You don't want to see the contents of my freezer - more ready meals than I've ever had in there.) So the thought of cooking Sunday lunch, rather than having our usual laid back, relaxed day, didn't exactly appeal.

Yet here I am, Sunday morning, cooking together a complicated curry lunch for friends I didn't mean to invite. ('Didn't mean to' does NOT equal 'didn't want to' - it will be lovely to see them and catch up.)

It's energising. I'm literally 'pouring out': food, but also myself - my time, my energy... A faint echo of Paul's words in Philippians 2:

Do everything without complaining or arguing, so that you may become blameless and pure, children of God without fault in a crooked and depraved generation, in which you shine like stars in the universe as you hold out the word of life—in order that I may boast on the day of Christ that I did not run or labor for nothing. But even if I am being poured out like a drink offering on the sacrifice and service coming from your faith, I am glad and rejoice with all of you. (Chapter 2, v 14 - 17, NIV)

I should be 'complaining and arguing' because I am spending more time and energy than is really sensible at the moment, but somehow I'm not. And I'm glad.