Last week, my cell phone, for reasons I still don’t comprehend, began holding hostage all incoming text messages for anywhere from two to up to forty-eight hours after they were sent. (With such lack of urgency, you might as well call me, e-mail me, or write me a note and come over to deliver it in person.) I’ve often left my mailbox close to full, because my husband, close friends, and loved ones have sent me some really nice encouraging, prayerful messages I like to reread when I’m having a rough time of it. This tendency causes my phone to beep more often when a message comes through to alert me to the fact that my inbox is almost 100% full. When it reaches capacity, then it will store messages until I erase old ones to make space for the new. Normally, though, the new ones come through as soon as old ones are erased. Not so this past weekend, so I erased all of my messages. Did that fix the problem? Of course not. So now I don’t have any of the messages from my spiritually supportive group, and my phone still being attitudinal.
I should probably warn you that my phone’s had a tendency for months to do tricks.
The most baffling one to me has been that on random days and at various times throughout the month I will receive a text message with no identifiable sender, and here’s the real kicker, the date and time sent are January 6, 1980, 12:00am. Apparently someone had an epiphany before I was even born, and they’re trying to tell me about it now. The text message is always blank, and it takes several tries to delete it before it will actually erase. After stumping the sales rep at the retail store yesterday (who’s worked there for eleven years and ain’t never seen anything like this), he called tech support and I got to talk to two different people who remotely reprogrammed and reset my phone. Thus far, I haven’t received any epiphanies from the 80s, not by text message anyway, and I’m getting text messages within the usual matter of seconds from when they’re sent.
All of this has made me wonder how open I am to God’s “instant messages” or promptings of the Holy Spirit throughout the day. I know I’ve had days where I’ve not had much time to process or “defragment,” as I call it, which makes it harder for me to take in any more information. I seem to do better on days when I get a chance to do the daily readings, attend Mass, have some quiet time for prayer, read a spiritual book, make something arts and crafts-like, and/or write.
What helps you listen to the Lord throughout the day so your spiritual/mental inbox doesn’t get so full that no more of his messages get through?
