Comfort

As a child,I can remember laying in the sunshine that came in the big picture windows in the living room. I would lay there on my tummy reading Sunday morning comics when I had successfully pried them away from a sibling. My brother liked to read the whole paper intact, I just wanted the comics and the Parade Magazine. Several of us enjoyed that same spot, twice as warm there as any place in the room. By the time I was in high school my brother bought his own paper and Sunday mornings I was in church, but I remember the spot and the struggle with great fondness.

My sister and I shared a small room growing up. There were no private places in my small home, and finding a place of your own required creativity. There was an old dresser sitting at a right angle, across from the heat vent in the corner of the room. If you sat with your back to the dresser and your feet on the heat vent you were almost invisible from the door way. This is where I would read. For hours and hours I sat in my own little world with Trixie Belden and Nancy Drew, Five Little Peppers and How They Grew, Little Women, Donna Parker and Anne of Green Gables. Later, my companions changed to Tolkien, DE Stevenson, Georgette Heyer, Agatha Christie, Ngaio Marsh, Dorothy Sayers and more. Still, for as long as I lived at home, long after my sister had grown up, married and moved on, I sat in that corner, imagining I was all alone in the world.

I was haunted as a child by demons in the dark. Many nights I would wake terrified, at first needing to be comforted, later learning some comfort techniques of my own. Many nights as I would lay in bed with my heart pounding, sure that at any moment one of the many terrors that would dominate my thoughts was about to overtake me, I would imagine the drive up the driveway to my grandparents home. Their driveways was dirt, filled with many ruts and holes, half a mile long. After eight hours in a station wagon with my family, when my dad made the turn, my heart leaped. Even today I can describe the drive, the mailbox, the pond and the trees and the barns. That drive took me away from fear and brought me to a different place, filled with adventure and belonging.

I am confident that the need for comfort is the essence of the God given need for relationship. I believe God is aware of our need to feel that sense of security and safety and wants us to do so. I think we find comfort in habits and behaviors and even in relationships in ways that may have started from a genuine need and the best we could do at the time, and stayed to become subconscious responses that keep us from making wiser choices now. For example, a have a child who processes stress or boredom or even deep thought by twirling his hair. I would ask where on earth this habit comes from, but I have noticed that when I am stressed or agitated or trying hard to think of a solution to a problem, I am constantly rearranging my hair! I know where he got it, I just really didn't notice that I do it, until I noticed that he did.

I am confident that God is not in the heavenly realms grieving over my hair therapy, or my son's either for that matter. Unfortunately, this isn't the only behavior I have developed over the years to cope. Some of them are more destructive to me personally, and interfere with my relationship with God. I am reminded of the story of Jacob leaving Laban's home and Rachel's removal of her father's household gods. She must have known the God of Israel, but she depended on the comfort she had from those life long sources. It seems like a silly story until I reflect on the damage some of my own household gods have done.

I still enjoy the paper in the sunshine, I still prefer to read all curled up away from others and I still sometimes lay in bed in the still quiet hours and the darkness and remember my grandparents driveway. I guess I will go on messing with my hair from time to time, but I am praying that God will gently pry the household gods from my hands and remind me that He is my comfort and strength, a very present help and trouble and more than enough.

Dust in the wind

Whew. Boys and Girls, my life has been a whirlwind of activity but very little creativity. This is not so good. In fact, I believe it is negatively impacting my brains ability to keep track of one billion miscellaneous bits of trivial information, as I once did so well. I find myself sitting still when someone says to me, "I will see you later" thinking where is it I am going that they expect to see me. I have had mornings when in a cold panic I have searched my calendar, you know that tiny print on your cell phone, and wondered if the nagging thought at the back of my mind is correct and I am supposed to be somewhere. I can't imagine myself in a position where my presence is of importance to anyone but I am aware that when some of have been denied it, they get a little squirrelly. Some even a might testy. I have had to look into the witness protection program a time or two.

You know, we have had an ice storm. I don't want to hear all of the places in the world where an ice storm has occurred because I know there are many. I don't want to hear how others have gone without power for six weeks when I was only out two week. In fact, I don't to be reasonable or rational about this at all. In fact, I think I can now safely report that I have failed disaster response 101. I am praying I do not have to repeat the course. You know how God does that at times, allows you a "do over" to get it right. I don't want to get it right. I don't want to play 'find the matches in the dark', 'how many lamps can the generator light' or 'cooking pizza on the grill' any more.

So, I was crabby over the power thing, then we got into disaster relief. Yes, there was a disaster to relieve actually. I have never in all of my life seen as many trees down for as long a distance as we have had. Trees opened like blooming onions, limbs hanging, root balls fully exposed. It really does look like a war zone, but I am tired of that example. So we set about getting that fixed up. This means volunteers, tractors, chain saws, trailers, four wheelers, food, front running, evaluation and some kind of sense of direction. Guess how many of these skill sets I have? Even the food one is marginal.

Now I am even more irritable and I am supposed to be doing ministry. Just for your information and for purposes of clarity, this is where my definition of ministry comes in handy. I think ministry is loving God's sheep, whether they deserve it or not because God has loved me in abundance. Even when I am crabby. Especially then, I should think. I have been trying hard, I truly have, only I suspect I have failed mightily. So why is this true, I wonder.

I don't know for sure mind you, but I think it has a lot to do with the lack of play time in my life. I have worked hard, and I like to work hard, but without a little nonsense, fun with creativity, play time with buddies, I think I am losing my passion. In fact, I think I have taken my heart right out of the picture and been using solely my head and some of my muscles. I am trying to do things well, when I am not sure what I am doing and the only affirmation I can count on is that there will be more to practice on tomorrow. I am trying, through the sheer force of my personality and determination, to make what I do not know how to do be done well. I think it's getting done but it's really leaving some scorched earth in it's wake. I am quite confident that my Eternal Father, who loves me so much that He is content to let me get all spun up in a whirling dervish, or whatever that whirling thing might be, until I am angry and empty and devoid of feeling and say to me, "Come here, child. We have talked about this! You are supposed to take time to watch the water, dance to something peppy, write something ridiculous. Why do you trust Me so little?" I dunno. I am so silly at times.

I am reminded today that we truly are only dust in the wind. The Creator of the Universe can handle things if I were to take an hour or day or even a whole week off. And while I believe we are expected to use our gifts to serve, the Sabbath rest was given to restore our souls.

I am going to play some this week. I am going to find joy in the sunshine, I am going to watch the water a little and I am going to write something goofy. Oh wait, I just did. Check.