Yes, I’m coming to a birthday. It seems like a person ought to feel like they know more every year. And yet, sometimes I think I don’t know anything about anything. There must be a balance here somewhere. Like, I know that you should dress nicely when you go out in public. Except that’s not a given. Just take a stroll around Walmart. How about that you should mow your lawn about once a week in the summer. That’s not a given either. All I have to do is walk around the corner and take a look at that house across from the bus stop. If my mower worked, I’d go mow it for them. Thank God for grandsons. There must be something. I know that the sun comes up in the east and goes down in the west. Ha! Got one! That proves you can count on God. But wait, what about the Holocaust and people who die too young and … I know another thing. God gets a bad rap. He knows everything and can change whatever He wants, so we point fingers at him when something goes wrong on Earth. I’m glad He’s God and I’m not. Not just because I don’t want fingers pointing at me. In spite of knowing we would turn our backs on him in an effort to be Him. In spite of knowing that when He sent His own Son to communicate His love to us we would crucify Him. In spite of knowing all the black-hearted, mean-spirited, disgusting things we would pull, He is love, and He loves us. He gives us freewill because He is love. There can’t be love without free will. So here we are, blaming Him for what we do ourselves. I know that. Maybe I do know more every year, just not everything. Thank goodness.
Category: God
Lifelong Learning
Have you noticed that there are some things you learn over and over again? Instantly, your mind went to how to work the technological marvel that is now television, or the personal computer, right? That’s not exactly what I had in mind. It’s not how many times your spouse tells you the same thing they said they told you before, either. (Though it’s possible they never told you at all, just sayin’.) It’s more about principles of living. Please apply this to wherever you get your principles of living from. I get mine from the Bible. It knocks me out how I can read a passage I’ve read before, and realize I don’t remember ever reading this. Some people say this is because I’m in a different stage of life when I read it today than I was when I read it the last time. The idea being that I’m applying what I’m reading differently. Perhaps. Some say I’ve read so much in the in between time, that it just slipped my mind. I guess. What sort of knocks me out, though, is that often, when I come to something again, it simplifies the complication of my life. For example, I tend to get all weirded out about whether I’m a rule follower, the kind of person who does stuff to get God’s approval instead of doing stuff based on following what He tells us to do. Then I come to “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and your neighbor as yourself.” Simple, if I’m loving, I’m good. It’s lifelong learning because I have to keep reminding myself. Could be worse, though, reminding myself to love is simple and grand.
Fear of Fame
I have a feeling that Toughnut Angel will soon publish somewhere. My first feelings are delight and excitement and anticipation. However, closely following upon their heels are feelings born of the thought that Nellie’s story will bring fame into my life. I do not desire fame. Fame takes away privacy and adds people who think you know everything about everything. I don’t even remember everything I’ve learned about Nellie, much less anything else. So fear is my next feeling. I follow that with a prayer requesting that God not give me fame.
However, there is no situation God cannot handle. I doubt that He will give me what I ask this time, about the no fame thing. I think He may be stretching my horizons, at 64 cotton picking years old. He’s like that. Just when you think you’ve got life figured out, He shows you the zillion things you don’t know spit about. I could kick and scream and insist, and He would give me what I’m kicking and screaming about, or back off me until I grow up.
However, I will not kick and scream. I’ve pulled that before, and it comes out badly. I have no idea where we’re headed, God and me and Nellie, but I trust God. If He leads me into the fearsome forest of fame, He will not drop me off to fend for myself. He will walk with me, and I will remain His kid. It will be OK. Jane, do you hear me, it will be ok! If you are looking at possibilities in life that put you in fear mode, all this about God is true for you, too, as long as you let Him lead. Have a good week.