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Showing posts from December, 2009

Sentencing

I think too much about things of little importance and spend too little time meditating on things that matter. Like most folks in our culture, the end of the year turns my thoughts to past events, both good and bad, and wonder at what the next year may bring. I know that I have lived more years than I have left to live. I am 52 and cannot even claim middle-age. I have no intention of being 104 years old. In my current state of health, I will be lucky to reach 54, but then I don't believe in luck. It's providence that I believe in. God ordained events, meted out to me in perfect parcels, containing exactly what I need for my sanctification. I know that but it doesn't keep me from wanting to negotiate with God like He's Monty Hall and ask for what's behind door number two. The road less traveled. The greener grass. The love that belongs to someone else. Those are the places my mind wanders when no one is looking. Opinions about the state of the economy, how to live

When the Cat Steals Your Joy

This year instead of my 7' Christmas tree, I had a this little Christmas Shrubbery. You see, I have a cat and being a cat she does all things cat-like. Well, almost all things. The next time she sits up and begs with my two little doggies, I hope to take a picture of it. No self-respecting cat begs and so having a picture of her sitting on her haunches looking for all the world like a doggie begging for food has got to carry some blackmailing power with it. Anyway, when you are a cat a 7' Christmas tree comes with the unbearable need to climb. Fragments of once shiny ornaments were scattered about my house like so much confetti at Times Square on New Year's Eve. So this year I foiled her with the shrubbery. Or so I thought. Remember in Monty Python's Search for the Holy Grail when the knights had the bright idea of making the giant rabbit and getting inside only they forgot to get inside? Well I had the bright idea a small shrubbery wouldn't be attractive to the ca

Mid-Strife Crisis Averted by Random Acts of Kindness

The best way to have to deal with something in your life is to tell people who love you, I mean really love you what that secret something you're dealing with might be. If you blog about being afraid to trust God and if you tell your pastor you're in a bit of a snit over the circumstances in your life, you can pretty much be guaranteed that you will have to face things that you would rather not and do it a whole lot sooner than you figured you were going to have to anyway. Confession is a catalyst for stuff to happen, good stuff and the not so good stuff. One of the first thing that happened was my heat went out. Did I face that problem by remembering God's goodness and provision? Sigh. No. I added it to the lengthening list of things that I am unhappy about. Neck injury, poor health, no job, no money being paid by the disability insurance, car needs maintenance, can't afford Christmas and now with the temperature is dropping my central heat is making sounds that resem

Uh-Oh....I am Afraid to Depend on God

Things are piling up on me. Bad things. Things that want to make me miserable. What sort of things? Well here's a look at some. I lost my job. I didn't lose it because the company downsized or because my performance was substandard. In fact, the company I worked for did everything thing they could to accommodate me. They offered an extension of sick leave and I couldn't in good conscience accept. I knew I couldn't be back to work in the time they could give me and their busy season is coming. There are lots of able bodied folks who need jobs and it was patently unfair of me to ask them to hold my position when I knew I couldn't come back. You see, I lost my job because I have injured myself and cannot physically perform the duties required. In August I tripped, fell, tried not to land on my adorable doggies and did a number on my back. I also aggravated an existing injury to my neck. The lower back is a bit better but the neck... well... it's not so good. Th

Buffeted

There is a fierce wind blowing outside today and it reminded me to read Ecclesiastes. This caught my eye: Eccl 1:17-18 17 And I set my mind to know wisdom and to know madness and folly; I realized that this also is striving after wind. 18 Because in much wisdom there is much grief, and increasing knowledge {results in} increasing pain. Today my emotions are as tumbled as the leaves flying past my window and like the wind they howl at me, twisting one way and then another in a confused carousel. Sometimes I long to be the young Christian I used to be- was it really better to have faith without understanding or does it just seem that way?