Last weekend while climbing the stairs with my arms full of books, shoes, and a bottle of iced tea, I noticed a dirty baseboard and bent down to swipe it with my sleeve. The bottle slipped from my arms and flew down the steps, banging left and right. Its lid popped off, and the tea poured over a neatly folded pile of clean sheets waiting on a lower step to be brought upstairs.

It then continued on down, drenching the carpeted steps and landing on a floor register at the bottom, where it poured the last of its contents into the duct-work.

The next day I was again on the stairs, this time heading to the basement to put extra groceries on our pseudo-pantry shelves down there. Though my arms were overloaded, everything was non-breakable except one item, the glass peanut butter jar riding atop the rest.

When I reached up to pull a light chain, it rolled off the pile and landed on the concrete floor. The jar shattered, mixing slivers of glass, PB, and peanut oil from the “all natural” brand I’d bought.

Two messes in two days. Surely God was trying to tell me something, but what? Not to overload my arms? To be willing to make several trips? To put things in bags before heading to the stairs?

That morning in my devotions I’d gotten the word “ponder” several times. I’d even written it down and prayed over it. Then that afternoon, while cleaning up my basement mess with a soapy rag, it came to me. God wants me to thoroughly ponder him without racing through my devotions.

My rushing around causing two accidents was his way of saying, “See how all that hurrying isn’t working? Don’t do that with Me.”

Instead he wants me to carefully, deliberately ponder everything about him and also the things he’s trying to teach me.

This morning in my devotions he wanted me to ponder pondering. Wanting to obey, I looked it up. It means to reflect, meditate, ruminate, weigh carefully, consider thoughtfully, think about deeply.

Wow. Pondering takes time! When I open my bible or approach him in prayer hoping to get something good out of it, I need to give him my full attention. That means finding a private place to meet with him, yanking my mind from the day just ahead, and turning off my phone. It also means opening my heart to whatever he wants to give, which might include stuff that’s hard to take, like conviction of sin.

To approach the Lord in a rush, hoping he’ll load me up with goodies after just a brief meeting is the opposite of pondering. That’s more like checking a box.

But coming to reflect, meditate,  ruminate, weigh carefully, consider thoughtfully, and think deeply is to guarantee significant blessings.

I might even be able to bless him back! And how nice to know that none of those goodies can ever spill or shatter.

“They received the word with all eagerness, examining the Scriptures daily to see if these things were so.” (Acts 17:11)