Feeling like a donkey

Someone sent me an email today with a simple chart about nutrition. I wanted to print it to put on my refrigerator. If I printed the email, the chart would be too small to read and surrounded with other words. Instead, I selected it, opened a word processor, and pasted. 

The pasted version lost something in the translation. It still looked like a chart but bled off the edges of the page. It took thirty minutes of fiddling to get it right and print a copy. When I was done, I wanted to throw the copy in the garbage because it wasted so much of my time. Actually, it was me that wasted time, but I won’t fit in the trash can.

Some days feel like this wrestling match with the chart. I set to do something and do not realize until I’m finished or the day is gone that it was a waste of time. Then I am angry at me for abusing the moments and wasting the hours.

Tonight, I read Matthew’s account of the days before the crucifixion. Jesus is about to enter Jerusalem and sends the disciples to get Him some transportation. Notice the animals in this narrative . . . 

The disciples went and did as Jesus had directed them. They brought the donkey and the colt and put on them their cloaks, and he sat on them. Most of the crowd spread their cloaks on the road, and others cut branches from the trees and spread them on the road. And the crowds that went before him and that followed him were shouting, “Hosanna to the Son of David! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord! Hosanna in the highest!” (Matthew 21:6–9)

The other gospels say Jesus was riding the colt only. I’m trying not to think how He could have rode both, or wondering what Matthew had seen that caused him to write it this way. I’m also trying to think what this event was like for that donkey.

The time of day is not given. Jesus traveled earlier and went soon after this incident to Bethany to sleep, so it was likely late in the day. Donkeys are not particularly cooperative animals. This one had never been ridden and the resulting ride involved crowds of people throwing palm branches. That this animal put up with this scenario smacks of the supernatural.

Yet the beast was merely a donkey. If he could tell the tale, he would make more of the noise and the bother of this day’s events than he would have of the One he had carried into the city. He might even sit back on his haunches and bray loudly about all he had to endure, without once mentioning that his Creator used him, or that Jesus was being praised.

Picturing this animal finds me superimposing the image over myself. As I sit here grumbling about what I did or didn’t do, or how my (my?) time was wasted, I sound like a braying donkey. This life isn’t about me. And when I do something I didn’t want to do, like waste my time, I cannot let it turn my eyes from what Jesus is doing. Turning my eyes on my supposed failures is self-centered — and putting my focus on me is just as significant a sin as my failure to wisely use my time.

Lord, it is good to feel conviction over sin. Time-wasting and whatever else I do that disappoints You are sins. However, wallowing in them when You have provided forgiveness and cleansing for the asking (and the confessing), is just being ornery — like that donkey would have been had he sat on his backside and refused to let You ride.

Throughout life I will win some and lose some. That is not nearly so important as what I do after each victory and each failure. Furthermore, the entry into the Holy city was not about the transportation. Neither will my entry into heaven be about me. Instead, it will be about You and all that You have done. I simply need to rejoice and be glad to serve You whenever You ask. 
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