Grains of Sand

Pixabay I linger in the blackness, seemingly invisible to passersby. My night is cold and lonely, devoid of the warmth of human touch. There is only God, and though He speaks, I do not hear from Him what I desperately want to hear. He begs me to trust His will, but that will lies heavily upon me, like a shroud. His will is solitary. His will is hard. He bids me be patient, but the fruitless, empty, years pass me by, heaping their rewards on others. Shared laughter mocks me, as groups of two, three, and four, walk by. Their eyes seem to meet mine but then slide past unseeing. I follow them, heading toward the open doors ahead that they are passing through. I long to cry out after them: “Look at me. See me. Hear me.” I don’t. They are busy with better, more productive, things. I bless the Lord for all their successes even as I envy them those blessings. Like a swift running current, they flow past my stagnant pool. It seems pointless to call out to them. Even if they saw and heard, ...

Pixabay Last night Marilyn and I were watching the baseball game. A commercial appeared, one that included a snippet of a song that contained that oldie, but goodie, that says when someone says "jump," the correct response is to ask, "How high?" I turned to Marilyn and told her that in the past I have sometimes gotten myself into trouble when someone told me to "jump" (to do something just because he or she said so). My response has often not been, "How high?" but "Why?" So this morning as I was reading Luke 5, I remembered our conversation of the night before. In the first eleven verses of the chapter, the story is told of Jesus borrowing a fisherman's boat so that He could more comfortably teach the crowd of people who had gathered to hear Him. At the end of His discourse the Scriptures tell us: " When he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, 'Put out into the deep water and let down the nets for a catch' ...

Pixabay I used to be the first one up on Christmas morning. Long before day officially broke, I'd quietly come downstairs and turn the tree lights on. Then I would sit and wait, and wait, and wait! Life is all about waiting, because we are always waiting for something. I have spent most of my life using public transportation so I always seem to be waiting for a bus, or a train, or a plane. We wait for doctors' appointments. We wait for good news, bad news, any news at all from family and friends! We wait for Spring. We wait for raises, and for the right house at the right price in the right place. We wait for the right gal or guy to come along (or we wait for the wrong gal or guy to go away—far, far away!). In Venezuela, people wait in long lines to get basic foods and medicine. In other parts of the world people wait for rain, or peace, or freedom. Some wait for the pain to go away. For Mary, nine months must have seemed like an eternity. But like every other pre...

There are times when God doesn't seem to be moving very quickly. There are other times when it seems we have to run very fast to keep up with Him. I have my "hurry up, please" list and my "slow down, please" list. Some day soon I'll give you all the details of the items that are currently on both of those lists. Right now, this "work in progress" is not quite ready to be revealed. Is there a verse of Scripture that covers both of these variables? Hang on, I'm looking! Aha, here there are in Psalm 37. The key word in verse 3 is " trust " followed by " delight " in verse 4 and " commit " in verse 5. All these actions are directed to God. Any success we anticipate in the business of crawling or running with God is found in our attitude toward Him. Trusting Him, delighting in Him and committing ourselves to Him daily, are essential to that process. Then comes what is specific to crawling with God. " Be still befor...

Abby watches and waits. Me, too. I'm not sure what exactly she expects is going to happen. Nor am I sure. But one thing is sure, something will happen eventually. I'm learning a lot from the patient waiting of the cats, though I confess they are far ahead of me. They never lose patience. I do. The truth is that God will respond and whatever happens will be just right. " And will not God bring about justice for his chosen ones, who cry out to him day and night? Will he keep putting them off? I tell you, he will see that they get justice, and quickly " —Luke 18:6-8. The moral of the parable Jesus told his disciples was not so much a reassurance as to God's faithfulness, but was meant to encourage them to persist, to watch and wait with faith. The cats already know. I'm still learning. Hmmmm, do I hear someone whispering something about "dumb animals?" It's not hard to tell around here who's smarter.

I'm a do-er, not a wait-er. I want things done yesterday. I want answers right now. Patience defies me, which is why God continually tests me in that area. I hope his efforts to make me a patient person aren't a lost cause. Intellectually, I know that they won't be, but every day I give thanks that He is perfectly patient with me, even when I am not perfectly patient with Him. Just when I think I might be making progress, I slip and fall again. So this morning's reminder was an appropriate one. "'Not by might nor by power, but by my Spirit,' says the Lord Almighty." —Zechariah 4:6. It's not that " might " and " power " aren't good things—after all we have to make an effort. It's that, in the end, we have to understand that God is the One who puts all the pieces together according to a perfect timetable. It is the Lord who works according to a perfect schedule. It is the Almighty who makes everything happen as it should,...