Back in my college days, especially in graduate school, I spent many an hour studying in what I called “research mode.” You anally focus on one topic until you are geninuely sick of it. You read about it, you wrote about it, you thought about it; it consumed you.

This could go on for weeks.

Finally, as you reached saturation on it, you were ready to let go of it. However, in the process you made it a part of you. Indelibly, forever. There were no doubts; it belonged to you at that point.

I’m back in that mode for the first time in decades. A biblical topic, the topic is consuming me; I once considered it an erudite subject without real application and “suddenly” the Ancient One has decided it is necessary to throw it continually in my path (almost said “in my face” 🙂 ), almost daily. 

I’ve got hundreds of questions that aren’t readily available in the Word. So I’m “researching.” I’m digging for gold and that takes a lot of sifting of dirt. I’m filling up pages of a spiral notebook with <gasp> handwritten notes and scores of passages.

Am I ready for the conclusion at which I finally arrive? Will I have the cajones to implement or, if necessary, ignore it?