Tuesday, October 27, 2009
Labor and Wait
Monday, October 26, 2009
Suffering
“Choke back in my heart all that rises up to question Your goodness. Let me sit in silence before You, and then I will begin to understand.”
Yes, pour out your heart like water in the presence of the Lord (Lamentations 2:19). Like Jesus the Perfect One, cry out and ask that this cup of suffering pass from you. But then sit in silence before Him (Lam. 3:28). He has ordained your suffering – do you believe this? These present sufferings aren’t worth comparing to the glory that will be revealed (Romans 8:17,18). Be patient and wait on Him(Lam. 3:26). He is good, so good, even in this.
Sunday, October 25, 2009
Venti Mocha, please
So my new addiction is to mochas. Must be the autumn weather and my recent sugar addiction – my sweet tooth has reared it’s ugly head and got the best of me lately. Well, llucky for my wallet, Starbucks now sells the mocha powder that they use to make their mochas. So, armed with my fabulous espresso machine and a can of whipped cream, I can now make my favorite drink for pennies on the dollar – yes, I am averaging about two a day. It is like comfort in a cup. And then I turn on my Harry Connick Jr. channel on Pandora (much to the chagrin of my children) and I am instantly in a Holiday mood. Something, I must say, I have not been in in quite a few years – When did the sweet season turn from a time of wonder, excitement, mystery and romance into the dreaded flurry and stressful dash that it now is? I would like to recapture some of the thrill of the season – some of the warmth and joy that it used to represent. How I long to simplify – the constant theme and desire of my adulthood – to strip away the superfluities and the extraneous obligations much like Thoreau or Ann Morrow Lindbergh have so eloquently described. To, in essence, start over. If this is a time to celebrate Christ, why do we turn it into everything but that? I am tired of things that fill my life that don’t really matter – I long for deep purpose and for meaning to be infused in my daily actions. To be driven by a passion or a cause that fuels my actions and my existence. Is this not inherent to the life of the Believer? If one reads the Gospels, it seems that it could be no other way – then why is it that I feel this so little? Questions that are not easily answered, I’m afraid. So I’ll sip my mocha, and take whatever transient comfort it may offer and attempt to leave the complexities of life in His perfect hands. “ Who has known the mind of the Lord, who has been His counselor?”
“This is not the life of simplicity but the life of multiplicity that the wise men warn us of. It leads not to unification but fragmentation. It does not bring grace; it destroys the soul. And this is not only true of my life, I am forced to conclude; it is the life of millions of women in America.” Gift from the Sea, Ann Morrow Lindbergh