I can’t believe we are in mid-August already! Where does the time go? At one of the Dollar stores I saw that Halloween candy and supplies are out and ready for purchase. A clerk says Christmas merchandise is on the way! It won’t be long and they will have their Valentine’s Day products out I am sure. Labor Day, the official end of summer, is 3 weeks from the time I am writing this and that means fall is on its way. Here in Indiana I love the seasons as they change and can’t wait for cooler air and the trees turning bright colors! I could do without Daylight Savings time, but no one is asking my opinion. It always strikes me as odd that we can grab our clocks and turn them one way or the other to adjust for the lighting outside. I don’t get it.
I think often of what it would be like to turn the clock way, way back! I long for the days of my youth and especially think often and give God thanks for my childhood cul-de-sac where neighbors knew each other and kids could play outside safely. Working in the hospital environment forces me sometimes to push my clock ahead a few years and wonder when I will be admitted, or what illness I will have someday. I like to worry about my health and then not necessarily make any changes.
I keep a calendar but a lot of my upcoming schedule I already know. Appointments, activities, meetings are generally in my head. Maybe that’s why some nights it’s hard to sleep. A new storage facility is opening up in my town and I was thinking I should go and store some things to give me more room . Then I thought maybe I should just take stuff to donate instead. Why hoard at this point? I counted 18 shirts in my closet half of those I don’t like or don’t wear! (Some shrink while hanging there, I don’t know if it’s humidity or what… J). So I feel God nudging me to give stuff away, to kind of “thin out!”
A friend recommended a book for the second half of life from Fr. Richard Rohr called “Falling upward”. It’s about spirituality for the second half of life and he is going to suggest it’s the best time of life, and the time to get close to God. Often we think of growing old as a time of loss, grief, medical issues and health concerns. I think I’d like that….to think more about “falling up” toward the Lord as we live out our days. I know I can’t go back and change the many things I would change. I know I cannot go forward and yet anxiety often pushes me to look into the future of what I cannot see. I think it gives more meaning to the Bible verse “This is the day the Lord has made, let us rejoice and be glad…” (Psalm 118:24). Not every day will we feel like rejoicing and being glad, but when we dare to take in what God has planned for us here in this life and in the next we can at least smile! The problems, challenges and difficulties will still come, and God will still hold all time in God’s hands. I think I’ll let it all go….and live for what I have in front of me, no matter how fast it seems to go by.
GLYASDI, PEACE BE WITH YOU ,
Pr. Doug
Eric is our current Webmaster and works on the NLS Communications Team. Raised in Judaism, he found Christ and the New Testament at age 16 in a Southern Baptist Church. He searched many denominations for the real church, only to find the Holy Spirit is present in all of them. He's worked for One for Israel, a group of native Israeli believers who are sharing the gospel in the holy land in Hebrew and is part of the only Hebrew speaking seminary in Israel.
