These Ordinary Days:

Not sure about the title of this blog, if any thing it is more of a quip than a title...reason being; there is nothing ordinary about any of these days!  These are the days and now is the time that, years from now, we will look back on and have som many feelings at once! "Wow, that was crazy", do you remember when, and the move, and not being able to find a house, and how expensive the apartments were!  Remember when we thought that there was no way that it would work...we would never find a place to move all of our stuff into, especially with only three days left!  Ha, yeah those were the days!"

Here we are on this journey of faith...sometimes I wonder if we are the ones even exploring...are we even holding the flashlight?  Or are we just standing here while life passes us by?  These are great questions but in the end it comes down to both!  Really, on a theological level how much are we in control?  "100%!"  How much is God in control?  "100%!"  Wow that a conundrum!?  This is one of those things that I am going to request a little more information about when the time comes!!!

 

blessing and God bless in the crazy times of life! 

The Light is far away...but Visible!

It is difficult to admit that you are scared about something, or worried about a current situation, or even anxious about the impending future. Being a male in American culture makes it even more difficult to express these types of feelings, but sometimes our despair, dread, and concern is too much to bear alone.

I am reminded about the John, a seventeen year old straight "A" student, star of the foot ball team, and all around good kid! He had big hopes and big dreams...he was going off to college...someday he would have a great job...someday he would marry the girl of his dreams...someday he would hold his child close to his body and praise God for his blessings...someday never came. John was killed in an automobile accident. Only 17, with his whole life ahead of him; he left behind his 14 year old sister and 10 year old brother...he left behind a mom and a dad...he left behind a grandma and a grandpa...a church...a youth group...a graduating class that would never get to walk with their friend.

When I reflect on the despair of his mother and father, and the regret of his brother and sister for the fight they got into the night before about what to watch...he didn't even get to watch his favorite show...and now...now he's gone. I think about his girlfriend who had plans to follow him off to college. I can hear her thoughts: "why, God why?", I think of the mom and dad: "we gave our hearts and life to you and you take our son; why, God why?". I think of his school mates: "will I be next?".

Who can answer the questions of the broken hearted? Who can make sense of injustice, unfairness, and evil? Is there anything to explain such pain and evil? I am always the first to ask such questions...but I have found, along with those who have walked through tough times that sometimes there are no answers...only silence.

But I know God hears our cries, our worries, our concerns, our anxieties, our pain, our anger, our confusion...God hears, and although you might not feel it right now He is there with, beside, and all around you. Even when we let go from weariness, fatigue, and pain...He never does!

This song reminds me of that incredible truth:

My life as a song...

I often joke that I have a difficult time keeping on beat with music! If I have said it once I have said it a thousand times...I'm that guy who watches the other guy, watch the other guy, and all three of us end up clapping off beat!

But whats the big deal? Who cares? So what I can't keep a beat? It's not like it really matters?

Or, Does it? There have been many times that I have been guilty of not doing my best, or having an attitude that emitted noxious poison; infecting everyone around; but usually when someone cares enough to point it out to me I automatically respond with the above questions. "So what I have an infectious attitude? Who cares?

I think this is the question that is often overlooked! Who does it matter too? When we step back and take a look at our own junk...it becomes very clear?

If your life was a song what would it sound like? Would it be incomplete, off key, two beats two slow; would you be playing with a broken instrument?

I encourage you to listen to the song I have linked too, and hopefully you will be challenged as I have: to live my life as a song worth listening too...and there is only One critic!