It's late.
I should be in bed.
I'm waiting for a load of clothes...
All my darlings are sweetly slumbering. What a week this has been! It was only a week ago that my college buddy, John, went to be with Jesus. I've been hesitant to blog or facebook. I just needed to process quietly. (Yes, I CAN do that:)
Yesterday was Luke's 13th birthday. We had a wonderful day, but my heart was somewhat geared toward the memorial service and John's family. Conflicting emotions competed for my attention and seemed to weave a pattern of quiet confusion on the underside of the day's events. In the midst of mourning and celebrating and reminiscing and contemplating the frailty of life, I got a text from my closest childhood friend.
Rachel was facing a birth day of her own. Over the past 37 weeks, doctors have explained that prenatal sonograms indicated "severe neurological abnormalities and deformities". They prognosticated (is that a word? i hope so, because it was very fun to type:) They prognosticated slim chances for this baby making it to full term and fewer that he would thrive long outside the womb.
This was information almost too much to bear on a daily basis. So many "unknowns". But that child was known by His Heavenly Father...knitting him together and knowing his name.
As we returned home from church, we got another text, "Austin Chase is here! One hour and counting..."
Tonight - thirty hours later - both Rachel and Austin face continued physical challenges, but they are doing miraculously better than some had expected.
So we keep praying.
And hoping. Not in a specific outcome, but in the Character of God, who never changes and never sleeps and has the whole world in His hands...especially the tiny little babies.
*****
I'm not a crisis girl. Or maybe I am. Much of the time, I tend to polarize my existential position between the extremes of blissful ignorance and freakish fear. Sort of like "I can't know that" vs. "the world's coming to an end". AND back and forth we swing.
But somewhere in the balance is where the most effective living happens. It's true: the world IS coming to an end...but maybe not before lunch already. And it is true that I can't know everything, but it wouldn't hurt to avail myself to unknown possibilities, even if they seem quite frightening.
This week, I have a renewed sense of urgency with which to live, but also a calm assurance that the compassionate Creator is alive and attentive to His perfect plan which is for our good and His glory. I have hope.
I will not live in fear that Philip will be taken. He may. I will not ignore the idea that our exchange of a kiss for a lunchbox tomorrow morning might be our last. But I will not fear it.
I will not be distracted by potential pitfalls and pain. I will not be deceived by the notion that I am guaranteed another day of happiness or health. I will not be devoted to the past nor the future. I will acknowledge eternity in my heart and set my mind on things above.
1 Peter 1:13-25
Therefore, with minds that are alert and fully sober, set your hope on the grace to be brought to you when Jesus Christ is revealed at his coming. As obedient children, do not conform to the evil desires you had when you lived in ignorance. But just as he who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do; for it is written: “Be holy, because I am holy.”
Since you call on a Father who judges each person’s work impartially, live out your time as foreigners here in reverent fear. For you know that it was not with perishable things such as silver or gold that you were redeemed from the empty way of life handed down to you from your ancestors, but with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect.
He was chosen before the creation of the world, but was revealed in these last times for your sake. Through him you believe in God, who raised him from the dead and glorified him, and so your faith and hope are in God.
Now that you have purified yourselves by obeying the truth so that you have sincere love for each other, love one another deeply, from the heart. For you have been born again, not of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the living and enduring word of God. For,
“All people are like grass,
and all their glory is like the flowers of the field;
the grass withers and the flowers fall,
but the word of the Lord endures forever.”
And this is the word that was preached to you.
