Ah yes.
A rainy Friday. It begs to begin with a grilled cheese on rye. I realize my penance will be more time on the treadmill and with the ever-smiling Denise Austin.
But for now, the grilled cheese is going down with Kenny playing in the background. His mellow voice assures me that I have made a good choice for the day.
Days like this remind me of why everyone needs a personal library of favorite books to curl up with and savor.
I have always enjoyed reading. Although, I confess, I have not always enjoyed WHAT I have read. Sometimes, the assignments from school were more an exercise in attempting to survive the moment and grab a decent grade on the way to snatching my diploma. But now that I am adult, I can honestly say that I do read for pleasure.
Whether music or books, a great deal of both are now defined by what brings me a sense of joy, peace or whatever emotion I need at that moment. I confess that I am also a big fan of well-written murder-mystery books.
Having said that, I issue the disclaimer that I DO NOT care for books where the overplayed sense of gory turns the story itself into an afterthought. Nor do I care for books that glorify and exalt bedroom antics as if the information was all new. Like the line from a movie once said, "I don't know, they wrote 'Fanny Hill' in 1742 [sic] and they haven't found anything new since."
I like books about the efforts of men and women in the military who serve a greater purpose than self. I listen to music that makes the same statement about becoming more than we are at a given point in time. And I listen to it for the same reason that I read the books.
I want to show up at the pearly gates with something in between my ears besides dust.
Well, it's time to get the chicken into the crockpot for dinner and the laundry beckons. I'll put Kenny on hold and bow to the need to move muscles I seldom use while the perky voice of Denise Austin soothingly reminds me I only have 12 million sets to go.
Ah, rainy days and Fridays...
October 24, 2008
October 19, 2008
What if it was time . . .
Thanks to borrowing a book (actually more than one, but I digress) and conversation after the 5k yesterday, I have spent the night thinking and dreaming about the coming gathering of Israel. If the time came, would I indeed join in the host of Israel, or would I turn my back on the calling and resist the word of the Lord for whatever justifications I could create?
Would I let family circumstances and choices dictate my own?
Would I have the courage to come 'out from the world' and hear the voice of the prophet even if others whom I had once trusted chose differently?
I can't say what the future holds for any of us. I am not foretelling gloom and doom, but I do wonder about my own personal understanding of just what it means to come out from the world and be gathered home unto God in the New Jerusalem.
Everyone I know, with rare exception, is trying to live a good life as best as they can. Sometimes, we fall short in our striving, but we get up and keep trying to make progress.
I can truly liken it to the progress of making my way through the 5k yesterday. It was an up and down route that was a bit tougher than I expected or was prepared for. Of course, I had no way of knowing just what it would be like until I got there.
A lot like our mortal journey, the 5k is a physical representation of the emotional and spiritual efforts which must be applied to be able to prepare to be counted worthy among the house of Israel when the time comes.
Not wishing to be 'salt which has lost its savor', I need all the help I can get. Sometimes, the balky child in me doesn't want to be told what to do, but the occasionally humble adult in me realizes that this isn't something I can do or claim on my own. I NEED the help, the support and the guidance of others and most of all, of my Father in Heaven, in order to make it home.
Rick and I had an interesting discussion related to it all. We decided we would need another trailer in order to bring what we had to share in the temporal preparations to help in our poor way to build the New Jerusalem.
It was sort of tongue in cheek at first, then it became rather animated as we contrasted the idea of gathering from our relative prosperity to the gathering of the early pioneers who gathered, by and large, from their want. They had little, yet those who believed that they were indeed following the Lord gathered what they had and pointed their wagons west to an unknown future guided only by faith.
We have a great deal of the blessings of life. We don't often assess our position in regards to the past generations who would look upon even the most humble of circumstances in our day and age and find themselves astonished to see the luxury that is so taken for granted.
Would those blessings of ease and prosperity keep me from being able to hear and obey?
Just thinking through the keyboard this Sunday morning. . .
Would I let family circumstances and choices dictate my own?
Would I have the courage to come 'out from the world' and hear the voice of the prophet even if others whom I had once trusted chose differently?
I can't say what the future holds for any of us. I am not foretelling gloom and doom, but I do wonder about my own personal understanding of just what it means to come out from the world and be gathered home unto God in the New Jerusalem.
Everyone I know, with rare exception, is trying to live a good life as best as they can. Sometimes, we fall short in our striving, but we get up and keep trying to make progress.
I can truly liken it to the progress of making my way through the 5k yesterday. It was an up and down route that was a bit tougher than I expected or was prepared for. Of course, I had no way of knowing just what it would be like until I got there.
A lot like our mortal journey, the 5k is a physical representation of the emotional and spiritual efforts which must be applied to be able to prepare to be counted worthy among the house of Israel when the time comes.
Not wishing to be 'salt which has lost its savor', I need all the help I can get. Sometimes, the balky child in me doesn't want to be told what to do, but the occasionally humble adult in me realizes that this isn't something I can do or claim on my own. I NEED the help, the support and the guidance of others and most of all, of my Father in Heaven, in order to make it home.
Rick and I had an interesting discussion related to it all. We decided we would need another trailer in order to bring what we had to share in the temporal preparations to help in our poor way to build the New Jerusalem.
It was sort of tongue in cheek at first, then it became rather animated as we contrasted the idea of gathering from our relative prosperity to the gathering of the early pioneers who gathered, by and large, from their want. They had little, yet those who believed that they were indeed following the Lord gathered what they had and pointed their wagons west to an unknown future guided only by faith.
We have a great deal of the blessings of life. We don't often assess our position in regards to the past generations who would look upon even the most humble of circumstances in our day and age and find themselves astonished to see the luxury that is so taken for granted.
Would those blessings of ease and prosperity keep me from being able to hear and obey?
Just thinking through the keyboard this Sunday morning. . .
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