{A New Year}

Happy New Year, friends. Are you still reading? I will be rather shocked if you are. This blog has been quieter than the 'western front,' this past year. Life, and all it's questions, demands, trappings and adventures, has stolen me away from my little pondering place. It's high time I return.

Perhaps I should set modest goals for this place, instead of hoping that every word will be profound and life-changing. Perhaps we shall merely talk about what we are reading. Perhaps we shall ruminate about what God is saying through the mundane things of life. Perhaps this will clear the clutter of worry and regret from my mental attic and clear the way for new growth.

Today, right now, God is good. In spite of all the clamor of unfulfilled hopes, empty ambition and the sourness of discontentment, God is good. He is unchanged by my intense worry, He is unmoved by my frustration and doubt. He is the same - yesterday, today and forever. Is that enough for me today? Right now?

..Rain..

"For after all, the best thing one can do 

when it's raining is to let it rain." 

- H. W. Longfellow

I have had a long absence from this little blogspot, but the longer I stay away the more the themes of life stay the same. The very difficulties that I write myself out of come back, haunting, returning to see how well I have learned the lessons of yesterday. The cycle of life and struggle and death and eternity will always be the same: a ring of endless light, as Madeleine L'Engle wrote. But to see the light through the struggle, now that is a challenge. Sometimes even the rain can blur my view. I've made plans for the day, I've done everything I can to order my piece of a disordered world, and then I step out the door and ... it's raining.

The pitter-patters and the rushing of a the little rivers sound so peaceful. The rain has come after a long summer drought. It's not enough. But for right now, today, it is. Suddenly I stop hearing my own selfish thoughts, my frustrations, all the drama in my little tiny world. It's raining. For a moment, the world has stopped turning and I just listen.

Suddenly I forget that my dearest grandparents are dead and gone. I forget the loneliness of being home without a husband for thirty-six straight hours. I forget the pain of watching a friend lose their loved one to cancer. I forget that the dog had spread mud from one end of my house to the other, wagging her furry, shedding behind. I forget that I was discontent with myself, my appearance, my attitude. For a moment, the world is nothing more than a beautiful place where God sends down rain, both on the just and the unjust alike. The transcendent beauty of this truth is enough.

When the rain stops, the birds come out and sing and the grass looks greener. The trees are rushing in the breeze, as if to dance because they've had a nice drink. The world goes back to its turning, spinning, whirling state. But I do not. There is something about the rain that makes all things new again... even inside of me, where sin and selfishness so quickly take root. The rain has made the soil in my heart soft, so that the Gardener can pull the weeds out. He can make all things new again.

The troubles of the day, of the week, of the year, can be forgotten. They can be laid at the feet of the Master Gardener. He can cultivate them into something more beautiful than I could ever imagine, if I will let Him. But first, I must stop, and let it rain.