Tuesday, August 30, 2011

In the Headlights


We usually finished our evening sessions around 10:00.  I was enjoying my first youth camp with the teens and pastor from our church.

(Let me just pause for a quick moment and explain something to you.  Everyone worries about getting old – doesn’t want to do it.  Let me tell you, there is nothing like it!  It’s liberating, and not only do you not worry about embarrassing yourself, you actually thrive on it!  But best of all, on your sixtieth birthday, you receive a “get out of jail free” card.  More to the point, an old lady card.  This card has gotten me out of moving furniture, helping with any chore that involves actually sitting on the floor, and pretty much anything else I choose to use it for.)

So for the four nights of youth camp, I played the old lady card and insisted on preferring my nice pillowy mattress at home to the perfectly lovely, hard and noisy ones at the camp.  

Every night found me driving eight or so miles to my house in the country from the camp even deeper in the country.  There were no neon signs and no street lights to clarify what I was seeing in the rear-view mirror.  In fact, what I mostly saw – or didn’t see – was pitch black nothingness.  So after I passed the occasional car or country store, the lights in the mirror seemed distorted – too high, too low, never completely reliable.

When I remember things that have happened in my past, I’m pretty sure my view is distorted there too.  Some details delight me because I idealize some memory and block out any unpleasantness or stress.  Not a good thing if that becomes a model by which I’ll judge future occurrences like holiday celebrations or goals set.

Or I become depressed remembering only the bad.  I can become consumed with guilt over things I said and shouldn’t have, things I didn’t do but should have, hurt over some slight that I’ve blown out of proportion – you get the idea. 

Paul gave us some good advice in Philippians 3:12-14:  “Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already been made perfect, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me.  Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.”

When my eyes are on God, doing whatever it is that He has asked for that day or even for the next ten minutes, I am focused on Him – I am living in the moment, but working toward the prize.  And that’s something I can depend on.  My headlights are stronger than my taillights, anyway.


Wednesday, August 17, 2011

Hardhats on the Porch

Close your eyes for a moment and think back to the first time you saw Star Wars in the theater.  (You babies born after 1973 will just have to remember when you rented the DVD.)  It was the first science fiction/space movie with amazing visual effects and it took my breath away. Remember the final showdown in the sky above the death star?   I loved so much about the movie, especially the sounds.  I can still recall the sound the light sabers made in battle.

If you had been sitting on my porch with me yesterday, you’d have needed a battle helmet.  My windows were open and my first clue was a tiny, relentless chatter from more than one bird.  Have you ever actually heard a hummingbird?  When they get upset, they can be pretty intense.

But the second sound was music to my ears.  The sound of light sabers in my holly tree!  Those little wings beating about 53 times per second multiplied by three birds equals major battle noise, light saber music.

Four hummingbirds come regularly to our feeders – I have two outside my porch window.  And depending on who is the strongest one day to the next, he and his buddy or mate feed on those sources.  The others live and feed out in the live oak at the back corner of the yard.

Yesterday though, apparently three of them were feeling strong and cranky at the same time.  And none was willing to yield.  So I had a battle on my hands.

Exciting isn’t word enough to do that scene justice.  At one point all three birds had chosen branches in the holly and sat facing each other.  Then one would literally try to knock the other off the branch.  They were fighting in mid-air, swooping and diving through the holly and stopping to catch a sip of sugar water when the others were busy with each other.  I kept listening for Obi Wan to whisper, “Use the force, little bird.”

The feeders hang still this morning.  Who knows.  There may be some little hummingbird doctor working away up in the live oak, repairing torn wings and trying to talk some sense into the battle-crazed little birds.  Hello!  As I type, my feeder just had the first morning visitor.  I need to go get my toothpicks - they may need crutches.

Friday, August 12, 2011

Looking for the Right Piece

Because I am an only child, I grew up hanging out with my cousins for company. We spent many summer days sitting around a card table with jigsaw puzzle pieces spread out in front of us. We would spend hours in complete silence as we concentrated on whatever section of the puzzle captured our interest (translate “seemed easiest”).

Somehow the puzzles got put up on the shelf when I began to raise my own family. We moved around a lot while Steve was in the army and, when he retired and started another career in northern Virginia, the kids were older and our lives were just too busy and full to take on a hobby that could eat up hours of time. I still took puzzles when we went on vacation and I had time to sit and enjoy them.

Imagine my delight when I was last in northern Virginia and I discovered my son’s family sitting around a puzzle table! This week they are all here in South Carolina and we are celebrating the “August girls” birthdays – my son’s fiancĂ© Erika, her daughter Eliza, Claire, Maggie and I all share August birthdays. We opened a table full of presents and one of mine was a puzzle with a picture of, how fitting, a beagle puppy, daisies and a basketful of green apples.

So we’ve spent hours together working this puzzle. And this morning, while the other adults were playing golf and the kids were still sleeping, I came out to work on it a little while I watched for hummingbirds.

This puzzle has 1500 pieces. I was putting apples together and, as I picked up the box to plow through the pieces, it occurred to me that there were probably 200 pieces, of which many were apple ones, already lain out on the table.

We love God and we want to serve Him. So we go searching for just the right place and opportunity. Don’t get me wrong. Ephesians 2:10 tells us, “For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.” And I believe He has done just that. So I do pray hard about what it is that He wants me to do.

But I also believe that I spend a lot of time “looking in the box for the right piece”, when there are “pieces” all around me that I could work with – and that would serve God.

Tuesday, August 2, 2011

Tasty, Refreshing, and Totally Unsatisfying

I stood at the pump and looked at the sign and got thirsty. I’ve grown accustomed to ignoring advertising that waves, yells, and flashes at me. Yet on this very hot summer day as I was pumping gas, the picture promising “Any drink only 69¢” was very appealing. The glass was tall and filled with ice. There was a strong gush of cola dropping into an already filled glass and splashing over the sides. Even the sign itself had what looked like condensed drops of water on it. I wanted a coke! (I’ll wait while you go to the kitchen.)

I stood there for a minute and thought about Weight Watchers (because at this point I’m considering that only a full-fledged, sugar-loaded, caffeine-packed glassful will do) and I thought about the fact that I would drink it down and still be thirsty. Because when you’re really thirsty only water does the trick. (I’m so pleased that you’re thinking ahead of me.)

And so yes, I considered that our attention is constantly receiving messages from this world that say, “Take what I have to offer. It’s the only thing that can satisfy that want, thirst, hunger.” When the Truth says, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life” (John 4:13-14), all the advertising spin in the world isn’t going to make the other stuff look better.

But let’s take this thing just a step further. Sometimes, I know I need to drink more water, but I really want other sugary substitutes. I have to make myself go for the healthy choice. It works like this – once I start drinking the water, I can’t seem to get enough of it! I thirst for more.

I was born in Hot Springs, Arkansas. (Did you know it is the smallest national park?) It was known for the warm therapeutic waters and “Bath House Row”. And, still, there are several places in town where there are no signs, no advertising. Just a small stone facing surrounding a tap from which pure, spring water continually flows. Cars line up filled with empty, plastic jugs waiting to be filled.

Isn’t it reassuring knowing that the well won’t run dry and we will never have to be thirsty?

John 7:38
Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him.