Category Archives: Metaphor

Grass Day 5: Not every seed takes

Posted on by
Reply

We made it! I blogged all week about grass (Day 1, Day 2, Day 3, Day 4) I can’t imagine being a farmer and not believing in a God. I get over and over again why the Bible uses agricultural metaphors. And the one I like to avoid is the parable of the sower.

Grass and grass and grass

Maybe not quite that much, Lord.

The bottom line in that parable is that not every seed grows. Every time I have been taught the parable of the sower it is always the same take away “make sure your heart is not of rocky soil, make sure your heart is a place where God’s word can grow.” I think that is a valuable lesson. God does want to sow all kinds of good seeds in my life, and I am discovering some rocky soil in my heart as of late. May God continue to rake it on out of there.

But as I was scattering grass seed in my yard on Saturday, all of a sudden I was looking at that parable not from the perspective of the soil, but from the perspective of the sower. Not every seed I sow is going to grow into a blade of grass or a wildflower. That is not the way things work.

Sometimes the seed doesn’t take because the soil isn’t right, or a bird came and ate it, or the wind blew it away, or it never got watered. But sometimes the seed has everything going for it and it still doesn’t grow. And sometimes grass starts sprouting in the most unlikely of places. Simply because it can.

It is hard for me, to know I can do and say all the right things, and yet sometimes the seed will not grow, that thing I am trying and waiting for simply will not come to fruition. I like to think that if I just work hard enough, that the seeds I plant will all grow. If I just pray enough than everything I am planting will bloom into beautiful works of God. But this is not it. Sometimes I am meant to do the work because God asked me to, and nothing comes of it but a better me.

And sometimes, growth just sprouts up. Just because God is good like that and doesn’t really need me to do anything, or just because He knows I would enjoy it. Grass starts growing in the most unlikely of places, just because that is the way it is.

But it isn’t my job to grow the roots and the stems, to pop hope out of the ground, to make it all work perfectly. It is my job to prepare the soil to the best of my ability, to scatter the seed, to water it until it rains. Growing it isn’t my job. It is God’s. And that is terrifying and peace giving all at the same time.

Grass Day 4: Rainy Weekend

Posted on by
3

The forecast for this weekend is rain. Normally I would be bummed about this. I love a good sunny weekend. And the potty training is defnitely benefitted from the Peanut running around the backyard naked peeing with the dog. But not today. Today I am hopeful for the rain. Rain makes grass grow.

Pinned Image

You see that green? That is what I am holding out for.

It is inconvenient, rain. It makes people stay inside and ruins thier plans. Rain makes everyone in the city of Atlanta drive like an idiot. Seriously, light showers will make everyone turn on their blinkers and drive thirty miles an hour on the interstate. And when you pass them they honk at you like you are the moron who can’t drive. No one is excited that there is rain.

But I am. Because rain is beneficial to making things grow. All of those tiny seeds need rain.

A month or two ago I tweeted this “Take my pride oh Lord, steal it from me.” And the Lord is faithful and is answering that prayer. It is hard and sometimes inconvenient. It is a little gloomy and doesn’t feel nice all the time. Sometimes I had other emotional plans that get rained out.

But without rain there is no growth. So I am learning to be thankful for the rain. Hopeful about the promise of growth in it.

Grass Day 3: Waiting for Grass to grow

Posted on by
1

So here we are after  day 1 and day 2 waiting for the grass to grow. And I have to confess. I am not good at this part. The waiting.

Pinned Image

I know Audrey.  I am waiting too…..

Every time I go in or out of the front door I check for new growth. The wildflower garden is in full bloom in my heart and mind, and I keep hoping that I will be greeted with a matching picture when I walk out the door.

I know that God can do this. Have a full garden spring over night. But most of the time He does not. Most of the time you see the start of something poke out, and like right now at my house I think, surely it is too early. But then think well maybe before I decide it must just be a weed.

The backyard…the waiting is leaving me in knots. I want so badly to believe that the grass will grow, that the seeds I planted will turn into a real live yard. But I don’t seem to have the faith for that. Instead what runs through my head is this “surely this won’t work. I can’t believe that I wasted all that time energy and money.” (Forty dollars is a lot of money at our house right now.) But then “wait, is that grass, new grass, no that was already there…I think…maybe.”

I am not good at waiting it turns out. And I already knew that. You should see the journal entries I wrote to Juliet when I thought she may be the twins. And my mental state after my second ultrasound. But there is nothing for me to do but wait for them.  I have been able to rest in that pretty well. Especially since I hope they don’t show up any time soon!

But I want the grass to show up soon, when I get home today would be perfect. I want to be able to do something, you know? And worrying feels like doing something…even when it is not. Worrying isn’t doing anything but making me unable to look in my backyard without feeling like I am going to throw up. It is me attempting to gain control of things I cannot control.

When I stop worrying I can  learn to grow other things along with my grass. Trust, faith, hope. Trust that the Lord wants good things for my life, faith that things will work like they were designed, hope that there could be change for the better. And the pragmatic part of me thinks, Lowe’s is not going to run out of grass seed anytime soon. Worst case scenario I have to do the whole thing over again. And the even more pragmatic part of me is rolling her eyes, “muddy backyard? If that is the only problem you have you are pretty danged lucky.”

It is such a little thing to be consumed by, considering the bigness of my God.

Grass Day 2: Seeds of Faith

Posted on by
5

 

As I explained yesterday, Juliet helped in the grass seed throw down in our back yard. Rarely is she allowed to grab handfuls of stuff and throw it all over the place and not get told “no, no.” Having a 22 month old (I am very aware that at this point I am just refusing to call her two because….she was a baby two seconds ago!) that you are trying to explain things to, makes you realize just how very little you actually have figured out. I mean, really, why do we have to wear pants outside anyway? What is up with that?

                                                       Little in the Hands of God is much…..
 
 

So I am tossing this grass seed out and I am thinking, this girl has exactly zero idea that we are actually doing something here. She has no idea that I expect something to come out of this activity. She just thinks we are running around the backyard having a good time. And really how would I explain it to her? These seeds are going to bury themselves in the ground, then they are going to open up and grow roots down and poke up out of the ground beautiful green grass. In two to four weeks.

The Peanut can’t even comprehend the time it takes for a cookie to cool down. She just knows there is a cookie on the counter and not in her mouth. So the time thing alone is impossible. And when you actually break it down, no matter how scientific you get, it still sounds a little mystical. Because it is a little mystical. This teeny tiny seed has everything it needs to become a blade of grass that can then die and regenerate itself. Everything it needs, with the right set of circumstances and this seemingly worthless seed becomes the grass I have been dreaming about for two years.

I was thinking about how if someone who had never seen anything planted came to my backyard they would laugh at me. This is surely not going to work. Sprinkle little beeds of dead looking grass in the dirt. Put water on it and you honestly expect the ground to be covered in grass? You are an idiot.

But I know that this is possible, that this is what I can expect, because I have seen it. Every year from preschool through the third grade I planted something and watched it grow, from a seemingly worthless seed to a styrofoam cup of live green stuff that I held with two hands because I did not want to spill it. Because I was proud of it, and thought it was pretty cool that a plant could grow out of a seed. We had a garden one year where I even grew pumpkins and cucumbers, and lets not forget the space tomatoes that we got from our LEAP class. ( I am aware there are maybe 200 people on earth that understand the back end of that sentence. Shout out to Mrs. Salvage!)

The doubts are creeping in, about these seeds that have been planted. (That is my post for tomorrow). But it is easy to keep them away right now because I have seen with my own two eyes, the evidence that given the right circumstances, plants do grow from seeds. There is not a way to explain it, you simply have to see that it is true. I think that is why we have small children plant stuff. The evidence takes hold stronger if they experience it for themselves.

I had seeds of faith planted in my childhood, and I got to watch them grow. There is a huge difference between understanding that God is your provider mentally because the Bible says it is true, and watching a “random” check show up a week after you prayed for the mortgage bill to be covered. Or have the light bill come back on after your dad met someone on the street who handed him a check on his way to tell the electric company he didn’t have the money. Or getting a phone call just hours after you prayed for a car, offering you the exact same car you just lost, only two years newer.

It is easier for me to believe the Lord wants to physically heal people, because I was healed. It is easier for me to trust that God will provide for our families needs because He has never screwed us over before. Even in my car accident, the Lord was faithful. But if I stop noticing, stop talking about them, I can forget about those seeds, and how they grew into blooming bushes of God’s goodness. Just like it is easy to forget that every living plant I pass every day starts from seeds.

It also makes me want to intentionally plant seeds with my girls, to pray for things and watch with the right circumstance of faith and love, those prayer seeds grow into bushes of God’s goodness. And to remember that those things started out as little seeds of faith.

How about you? What bush of goodness is growing in your life?

Grass Day 1

A week in planting grass.

Posted on by
10

Saturday we got out of the house so Christian could write. Plus Jill hates going anywhere by herself and she had two anywheres to go. So we piled into the station wagon, just us girls, and headed for all the errands. We ended up at Lowes, where I got some grass seed and a bag of “southern wild flower seed” on a whim. I had a surprising number of thoughts about all this. So here we are a week in grass seed. 

Pinned Image

This is pretty much what I was dreaming of…I found it via flickr.

Part 1: The emotional roller coaster that is my lawn.

I showed up at the Lowes, my babies and sister in tow. By the time we got around to buying the grass seed, the Peanut had decided she was too big for the riding business, and was in charge of pushing the cart. (She may have had some grown up help as we did not want her to ram Rooster into anything. No killing your sister is officially a rule at our house.)

It was intimidating. I don’t know anything about grass except that it grows in lawns and it is nice to have. And we need some. But we went out to the lawn and garden section and found a guy who could point us in the right direction. Just your every day average lawn? There were two choices. As I went to choose a woman mentioned that she had planted her grass seed just two weeks ago. Hers was growing in really well and she was buying more seed just to fill in the patches. Sweet. Two weeks? The lawn would for sure be in, in time for the Peanut’s second birthday party! To be on the safe side I got the fifteen pound bag.

I was feeling really good about my fifteen pound bag of grass. I can do this. All I have to do is put it down and water it. No problem. My lawn is going to be beautiful! It is going to be lush and green and Peanut and Rooster are going to play in it all summer. They will roll around in it, getting their clothing all stained green and smelling of earth. This will be awesome it could even be fun.

Then I got home and read the back. I had gotten distracted with my wildflower garden and had spent some time and energy raking that out and repositioning the brick border. So when I read the back of the grass package, I was already a little over the raking part. It just the actual doing it seemed a lot less fun than the idea of planting the grass. It was certainly less fun than playing in the already grown grass with my girls (we are studying alliteration in class, hey!). Which is what I kept thinking about when I bought the “super easy” grass.

I was supposed to rake out the debris, then evenly spread the seed, then rake it in really good. Wait a minute, this is not what I signed up for…I thought it was a drop and grow kind of seed. Just how much of the debris needs raked out? How deep do I have to rake? How evenly distributed? I have a 22 month old who is dead set on helping….. Maybe I was in over my head.

I raked as much debris as I thought necessary. Then I started the process of distributing the grass seed. I didn’t have one of those push spreader things, so it was just me and the Peanut tossing handfuls of grass seed across the ground.

I started by going up and down in rows, stopping every once in a while to rake the seed around more evenly. But the Peanut wanted to help and I have never been one to be able to stick with any sort of organization, so our rows became much more rambling and pretty soon we were just running around all willy nilly throwing grass seed everywhere. I mean, I had a plan in my head and I think we covered it all,  but we didn’t go as evenly or as perfectly as I had once set out to go.

Then I started to feel bad about that. What if I didn’t get the grass all perfect? What if it is all clumpy and there are bare spots? What if it doesn’t grow at all and I may as well just throw forty dollars worth of pennies all over the backyard for all the money I wasted?

And then I started to feel bad about myself. Calvin would have done this perfectly, Tiffany can make anything grow, I should have shelled out the money for sod. This was a terrible idea and I wasted time and money (neither of which I have a lot of lately) all for nothing.

So I decided that if I get sporadic clumpy growth I will be happy. And I started this thing dreaming of rolls of lush green carpet for me and the girls to sink our bare feet into.

And then I realized that in many ways I do exactly this. Especially with the things I believe God has called me to do. I am a little intimidated at first starting a blog, or (and again I hesitate to write this, but I feel like it may be my next step) marketing myself as a Christian speaker. But then I get a little information and I am pumped. Yes! I can do that! Yeah, this is going to be awesome! I will start publishing posts and the Holy Spirit will take over and I will get a couple thousand hits a day! (on a good day I get 60. And I have been at this for over a year.) I think that God is big enough to do that, but for this He seems to want me to do the work.

When I actually start doing it I have a plan. Sometimes the plan is manageable and sometimes it is not. But often I abandon it and start sporadically dropping things here and there all willy nilly.

Then I beat myself up about not sticking to the plan. A million other people can do this better. I finish, but defeated, sure that no grass will grow, nothing will come of the work that I just did. And my faith in a great work, the one the Lord entrusted in me, is shrunk to just hoping that He can grow something, anything out of it. But it certainly won’t be that thing I had in mind to begin with. I’ll just be happy with a little bit, God, could you just manage that?

Somewhere between the green lush grass my babies will nap in that is in my head, to the actual planting of the seed, to the waiting, waiting, waiting….I let my faith die. Until I am begging God for a sliver of the dream that I was promised in full.

I think I am selling that grass seed short. I think it probably will grow and be fine by May 1. And I am selling my dreams short too. They weren’t labeled specifically, but these here posts are seeds I am planting. And I know that God will grow it into something beautiful.

What are you planting in your life? How is God growing it?

The Importance of A Primary Text

Posted on by
7

We are in full on PhD mode at the Norman house. Christian is in the middle of writing at least two of his major papers for the semester, which includes researching for those papers even during spring break.

Before you feel to sorry for him, you should know that one of Christian’s major papers is about the evolution of metaphor in the X-Men comic books. So some of his research involves pulling out his comic book collection and leafing through those bad boys. It may not sound very academic but it is important.

The very basic academic theory is this: If you are going to write about something, you should read that something, not what other people think about it, what does it actually say? Then draw your conclusions from there.

If any of you were smarty pants students and took AP history, you learned about a primary text. Rather than study what the book says about Ben Franklin’s thoughts on the constitution, how about read a letter from him to someone about it. Then make your conclusions based on that. Not that other commentary isn’t important, but for serious study we need to look at the primary texts.

I am learning that the academic standard is God’s standard as well. He is okay with me reading Bible commentary and spiritual blogs. But I shouldn’t substitute it for His word. God doesn’t want me to base decisions for my family or draw conclusions about Him and our relationship based solely on what Beth Moore or Priscilla Shirer say about God. Those ladies definitely help point me toward the truth, but they don’t speak THE TRUTH. And I think they would say the same thing, you  have to get into the word. You will grow when you understand better what it says.

Bible commentaries and spiritual books are awesome, but we have to put a priority on the primary text. The question is not “what does this awesome spiritual person say about what God says?” The question is “what does God say?” And I need to spend more time looking at the primary text.

Jesus the Contractor?

Posted on by
2

I read this blog post last friday. It is about building a castle. How the Lord comes in to our hearts and desires to build beautiful wonderful things out of our hearts and lives. But all we wanted was for him to fix the leaky roof to our humble cottage. I suppose I knew Jesus was a carpenter, but I never thought of him as a contractor before.

On Saturday we had women’s group and I mentioned the post. Jill said something along the lines of “Yeah, remodeling is inconvenient! Sometimes you have to do your dishes in the bathtub.” I can’t get the thought out of my head, that the remodeling of my life, of my heart, of my soul, is likely to be uncomfortable and inconvenient at times.

There are times when Christ brings in the sledge-hammer and proceeds to knock down walls that you had been told were holding the house up. It is scary watching the support walls in your life crumble, only to discover that they were not as necessary as you were told. Or that they were necessary, but He put up some sort of non-permanent solution until the whole thing is remodeled. It sometimes looks like your life will come slamming down right onto your head.

Or sometimes he moves things that have been in place for years. Jesus changes around the light switches in the house of your life, or turns the water off to a particular faucet. It is so hard to unlearn old habits and stop turning on faucets that have worked in the past. That water needs to be cut off so that we will stop using that faucet. But we still go back until we finally have a new normal.

Sometimes Christ comes in and tears down the back deck, and you are annoyed. You liked that back deck; you used it. Where exactly are you supposed to put the grill now? It is really annoying. Why would he just tear down something that was working? But then He puts in the screened in porch of your dreams. Of course the deck had to go.

But mostly, when people talk about the inconvenience of cooking for months on a hot plate and a microwave, or doing their dishes in the tub, or having a family of seven using only one bathroom for a year, they talk about how it will be worth it. They have seen the plans, or designed those plans themselves. And when this inconvenience is all over the house will be bigger, or better, or nicer. The mess will be cleaned up and the dishwasher will be re-installed. The frustration will be over and a beautiful home will be in its place.

I don’t know what the final product will look like. The Lord knows there is a LOT of remodeling to be done in my life. But I know and trust the contractor intimately. And I believe that His design will be worth it.

Cast off Your Chains

Posted on by
3

Cast off your chains my friends, the ones that have been weighing you down. On the left wrist, the chain reads “try harder” on the right “do better.” Wrapped around both ankles is the chain of “you are not enough” it is held together with the links reading: should. I should be thinking this, feeling that, doing the other.

Should be spending less, should be giving more. You should have gotten to church on time and been more productive. You should be more, do more. You should get your act together. The shoulds link together wrap around your shoulders until you are stooped and shuffling along.

Some of these chains have been there so long, they feel as much a part of you as your arms. Some have snaked into your body and wrapped around your heart until it beats to the rhythm of the chain. Shouldshould, Shouldshould, Shouldshould.

Somehow, somewhere, someone taught you to wear these, maybe even wrapped the first one like a scarf gently around your neck. You are not enough, it read. But now you dress yourself in these chains every morning, some you even sleep in. Never take them off.

Someone may have even told you that Jesus wants you to carry these chains. They are a testament to Him, proof that you are faithful to your God. But these chains, these thoughts of inadequacy, these are not the things the Lord has for you. Jesus came to set you free from these chains.

Look closely, you will find the shackle on your wrist is unlocked. You do not in fact have to walk around today with the weight of trying harder and harder still. Let Jesus take that from you today. Allow Him to be enough…instead of you trying to be.

It may feel awkward, maybe even a little scary at first. New found freedom usually is. But soon you will realize, that without this chain, the one telling you to try harder, that your range of motion is extended. With Jesus holding the weight of that trying, you suddenly have the freedom to do just that.

Soon you will be dancing to the sound of those chains falling away. The sound of the clanking will cause your heart to dance with joy.

And your heart, oh your heart, it will recognize the freedom of the falling chain, reject the chain that snaked its way in. It will no longer beat Shouldshould Shouldshould. Instead it will beat Beloved Beloved. Because you are, just the way you are. No shoulds attached.

The Failure Siren OR Things I am Attempting to Un-learn

Posted on by
5

Saturday, the Peanut got into the german cold cream my brother-in-law gave me for Christmas. Penaten cream is awesome for dry baby cheeks and diaper rash, but it has a bit of a sticky quality to it (we have sent the Peanut through three showers and I don’t think it is out of her hair. Good thing she loves showers). Sunday morning I realized that her tennis shoes were covered in cold cream and we could not find the other leather Robee anywhere. My kid had exactly one shoe to wear to church…awesome. So I dropped Christian and Rooster-head off early and off we went to Target.

We were late to church, but we weren’t even the last ones through the door. It really was no big deal. Except, it felt like a big deal.

It felt like I am a terrible wife and mother, worse, that I am a terrible woman of God.

The reason we couldn’t find the dumb leather shoe was because my house is a disaster. There are q-tips all over the living room floor where the Peanut left them, a cheese grater in the hallway (courtesy of guess who), toys and shoes and clothes and stuff that I need to find a place for are everywhere. Christian and I have the tendency to leave stuff out or drop stuff as soon as we get in the door. And the Peanut loves to shuffle it all around.

And if I am going to be honest, (you know, because I never let it all hang out on this thing) I pretend it doesn’t bother me. It haunts me, like so many of these seemingly innocuous failures do. But the house, the state that the house is in most of the time. That is the thing that makes me sob during worship as my friend wraps her arms around me and tells me that I am doing a good job, that my kids and my husband are remarkably happy, that she is sure glad I am teaching high schoolers. She believes I am called to it just like I do.

If my days were like a leisurely Sunday drive, they would start out just fine. But slowly I would notice that I hear a faint siren, like any ambulance siren. Wee-ooo, wee-ooo, wee-ooo. Only this siren doesn’t go wee-ooo, wee-ooo, wee-ooo. It goes fail-ure, fail-ure, fail-ure. To the exact same tune and rhythm.

On good days I only hear it faintly and I can tell from the sound that it is headed in the opposite direction. I don’t need to worry about that noise, it has no bearing on where I am or the direction I am headed.

On other days I hear it coming, fail-ure fail-ure fail-ure, but it does not overtake me. I turn, it turns, I pull over and let it pass. Those days I have a moment or two when I think it is coming for me, the failure siren, but something or other allows the noise to leave my mind.

But there are days when I spend my moments trying to outrun the siren. And as I speed through the day it keeps coming closer. I try desperately to avoid the siren, fail-ure fail-ure. I start running red lights and taking sharp turns. I careen through life hoping that I don’t run over anyone while I am just trying to get away from the noise. Fail-ure Fail-ure Fail-ure.

It comes. Closer and closer until it is right next to my car and the lights and the sound are so bright, so loud, so frantic that it is the only thing I can think or see or hear. FAIL-URE FAIL-URE FAIL-URE. YOU ARE NOT GOOD ENOUGH TODAY. YOUR KIDS, YOUR HUSBAND, YOUR STUDENTS DESERVE BETTER. GOD DOES NOT APPROVE! And even when the moment passes and the ambulance finally leaves. The sound resonates in my ears; I see spots from the lights and I have trouble thinking. I am shaken deeply by the encounter. I cannot let it go.

Those are the days where I tell the story of my failure loudly and to anyone who will hear and then laugh my loud, occasionally obnoxious, laugh and hope that you join me. I am re-telling the same story and laughing at the same parts in hopes that if I just talk and laugh and have you laugh loud enough it will drown out the remnants of the siren. Sometimes it does. Sunday it did not.

I shouldn’t be surprised that the failure siren overtook me on Sunday. That failure came as a direct result of my inability to keep my house in order. And I am trying very hard to un-learn the lies that I have learned about a woman and the state of her home. How those things are connected and how she should find her value in that. But it is still deeply ingrained within me. That a woman’s job is keeping her house and the affairs of her husband and children in order, that no matter what else she does if she is not doing this well she is failing.

I am coming to terms with the fact that I believe this lie so deeply because the church reinforced it. I have been very lucky to have had largely positive experiences when it comes to the three churches that I have been a member of. But the church is made of people and those people sometimes get it wrong.

I have been told over and over again that God cares about the state of my house. As a woman, it speaks to my Godliness. A Proverbs 31 woman would keep her house neat and clean and always know where her kids shoes are.  Folks, I just read Proverbs 31, and that lady works super hard and her husband and children think she is awesome. But it never says in there that she has a clean house. But it does reference the servants who are probably pickng up said house. Why did people tell me that it talked about the state of my living room?

Fact: I once read a study companion to Esther that told me one of the main take aways to that amazing story was that we should always be presentable and have a presentable house so that we could use our neat houses for God’s glory. Never mind the fact that Esther had people who made her and the house that she was being forced to occupy presentable. She had nothing to do with it. I think this version is probably more accurate.

Somehow the lie that God demands that all women are called to home and hearth, that if I do not care that the baby clothes are in the living room and I have absolutely no clue what I am having for dinner until Elizabeth feeds it to me (With a glass of wine. You are the best girl. The best.) that I am not a Godly woman has seeped in so deeply I don’t know how to dig it out.

I know women who are called to serve the Lord in their home right now. I think that their work is difficult and valuable. And I am grateful they do it well. I have been blessed by more than one of these women more times than I can count. But honestly, I don’t think I am called to be one of them.

Christian and I are both people who can thrive despite (and sometimes because of) chaos. Stuff all over doesn’t bother me really. This trait in the past has made people crazy (oh hi, mom, sisters, college roomie) but right now it is a serious asset. It allows me to use the small window when I am home and the girls are awake to play with them. It means I can take the girls out of the house on the weekend so Christian can get some reading and writing done. Because if I am out of the house, then I can’t clean it.

Right now hospitality does not look like a clean house and some fresh cookies I baked just because. It looks like me swallowing my pride and inviting you to move the toddler clothes and have a seat. Sorry if they smell like pee. I hope that this is not how it will be forever, but my kids, my husband and my boss are all currently happy with me, so for now it just needs to be like that.

In my head I know that this is true, and in my heart too, but the failure siren…I am learning that I may out run it some days, but to really get it to shut up, I better de-construct it.

When the Fog Descends

Posted on by
Reply

The weather has been crazy lately. Last week I went to go see the final addition in the 1027 church baby boom (welcome Ethan!) and by the time I got to Jill’s house to take her big dog and my bus-like stroller for a walk we decided the fog was so thick we didn’t want to risk even walking along the roads. It took me ten minutes to get the mile and a half home.

Sometimes in life the fog descends. You are in a familiar place and your path looks clear. You are on auto-pilot as you head toward your goal. Tra-la-la praise Jesus, I am racing closer to him on my clearly demarcated path. And then, the fog descends.

Sometimes it creeps up on you. Slowly your surroundings get muddled. You keep thinking, “this isn’t terrible, I will be fine if it just doesn’t get any worse.” But it does. And sometimes you are driving along and then BAM you can’t see a thing. The familiar looks unfamiliar and it is all you can do to just keep from running in to anything. You throw your GPS in your lap and pray that it tells you to turn at the right time. You need assistance to get home from a place you have been a thousand times before. You pray you will make it home without serious damage to you or anything surrounding you.

And the fog, it isolates you. It makes you feel like you are the only one on this path. You can’t see anyone else on the journey.

I know that these times are terrifying. You thought you knew where you were going, you thought the turns were clear. Now it is all confusing and you can’t even see the street to get home. But do not let the fog isolate you. Use your Bible and your community as your GPS. Let them tell you where you need to turn. Keep your eyes open for the other people on your journey, assure yourself you are not alone. You will pull into your driveway, and eventually the fog disappears.

I am praying for you today. That you will be safe in the fog, that it will clear up soon.