a poem for the spiritually undisciplined

Dear God,

I don’t want to come to you this morning

because

I don’t want to come to you as much as I should want to

but I do want to.

Just not as much as I should want to.

Can I still come?

Or should I wait

until I want you properly

without every third word being interrup-

like why am I thinking about

the thing I had for tea last night

when I’m supposed to be talking

to the God of universe?

Stay focused.

Stop being so easily distr-

red light stop!

See that’s another thing:

If I wanted you properly

I would have got up early enough to talk to you

before I left the house

instead of while whizzing round roundabouts.

I wanted you

but not as much as I wanted sleep.

So shall I wait then –

For the day I choose you

over my bed,

plant two

defiant feet

firmly on the floor

and get up to pray?

Or can I come now?

I think if I wait

for the day

when I want you as I should want you,

I will be in a new body

whizzing round heavenly roundabouts

in a glorified car

having already prayed before I left my mansion.

And I will have missed out

on a hundred

even a thousand

interrupted conversations with

you.

Georgie Coster is a staff nurse in a Midlands Critical Care Unit.

‘You study the Scriptures diligently because you think that in them you have eternal life. These are the very Scriptures that testify about me, yet you refuse to come to me to have life.’

John 5:39-40

‘…whoever comes to me I will never drive out.’

John 6:35