In Which the Author Betrays a Deplorable Lack of Self-Loathing

Often, the quickest way I can adorn myself with "the imperishable beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit" (1 Peter 3:4) is to take a walk.  It un-does tension and cabin fever and unseats me from the center of my little indoor, task-oriented universe.

Today I moved along through the final sparse raindrops of a heavy shower, listening to the preface and first chapter of J.I. Packer's Knowing God, the January 2012 free-download-of-the-month from ChristianAudio.   I re-read the book every few years, and although each reading finds me more "grown," each reading also finds me more apt to think highly of myself.  Appropriate, then, is Packer's warning from C.S. Lewis: 

Those like myself whose imagination far exceeds their obedience are subject to a just penalty; we easily imagine conditions far higher than any we have really reached.  If we describe what we have imagined we may make others, and make ourselves, believe that we have really been there--The Four Loves

I sighed and stopped the audio to mull over my motives. 

But the afternoon was rich and fresh; my blood was oxygenated; grandchildren were coming for dinner. I've never been one to wallow very much, preferring to promptly make confession, ask for grace, and go on.

So I switched my iPod to Tamacun and Diablo Rojo and all but salsa-ed back home.