I'm Dating the One in the Onesie

After being mistaken for an Olympic athlete twice, Brian was part of the Opening Ceremony last night [much to my overwhelming delight]!  That's right, if you look [VERY] closely in the picture below, you'll see his handsome face in the very far left of the screen. Well, half of his face anyway. But considering I missed most of the theatrical portion of the ceremony because I was too distracted with looking for him, I'd say it's perfect.

Which makes him pretty much famous [at least to me :)]. I have seriously never been so excited or more proud of him! And considering he is one of the biggest blessings to me ever, that's saying something.

http://www.greenwichtime.com/news/article/With-royalty-and-rock-Britain-opens-its-Olympics-3740793.php#photo-3247887

Hence, the blog post about nothing more than how proud I am of my official trap-door-opener of the London Olympics. I love you, best friend.

A Bedtime Story

I wrote this a while back, but I found it extra comforting tonight after a long day of hard conversations, much-too-soon goodbyes, and difficult spiritual growth.  Each and every one of those things turned out for good today, but that's why I continue to love this image of Christ!  Especially when my human spiritual warrior is off doing important things in the far away land of London, Jesus fights for me. Always. 

This is A Bedtime Story.

From right here, from this very warm corner of my bed, I can see the bright, two-building skyline of downtown Lexington reflected in my closet mirror. For the moment, only the cold breeze blows through my open window, no shrill – not even a whisper – of the sirens and screeching brakes that seem to constantly remind me that just four stories below a big world hustles and hurries around me, relentlessly and essentially unaware of my one body, one mind, one soul. The quiet won’t dwell long, it never does, but what a blessing it is, a tiny oasis in the swelling tidal waves life often seems to personify.

I like these peaceful seconds. God likes these peaceful seconds too. I know He does, because He likes to come and sit with me in these peaceful seconds so we can share them. He doesn’t usually ask for much, not even for the extra blanket at the end of my very warm bed, and His presence is anything but assuming. He simply tells me stories. He tells me that one time He calmed real tidal waves in a real storm when no one thought He had it in Him. He tells me that He secretly whispered to the girl at Starbucks today to give me my tea for free just so He could see me smile. Actually, He corrects Himself and says that He really paid for my tea today Himself, because He likes to flirt too. After all, He desires to be pursued and noticed just like I do. He tells me of big battles He fought for Joshua and Gideon, and explains that He has used the same defensive strategies in the battles He has fought for me. He tells me that he wants to always fight for me. He tells me He always wants to be my Hero.

Usually when He gets to the part about Him rescuing His lovely maiden, I, His lovely maiden, drift finally and gently off to sleep. Because I know this is no ordinary bedtime story. The sirens may resume and the quiet may once again fade away, but my Love will forever protect me. My Hero will fight for me. Always. And tomorrow, with a smile on His face and sweat from the battle on His brow, He will come and sit with me and tell me another bedtime story, a bedtime story even better than the one before.

A Spirit and a Soul

This is merely a musing that came to mind after studying Hebrews 4:12 tonight. It hasn't been well developed or well prayed over, but it has encouraged me nevertheless!

"For the word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing SOUL and SPIRIT..." - Hebrews 4:12

Apparently this was a verse I had memorized and recited a hundred times without really understanding. I got that the Bible was important, as well as applicable to any life situation, regardless of whether the struggle or experience even existed at the time our Bible was written. But I never even noticed that "soul" and "spirit" were obviously two very different things. Though they are often used interchangeably, they can't be interchangeable if the word of God serves to differentiate the two!

So I did a little research and a little praying.

From what I understand, the "soul" makes up the immaterial part of man that consists of the will, the intellect or mind, the emotions, and the desires. The soul is what makes a man not just a human, but a specific man. It is the part of you that makes you YOU, as opposed to your next door neighbor, your friend, or any of the other 7 billion people on the planet.

The spirit, by contrast, is the part of you that provides the clearest image of who God is. It is how we commune and communicate with God. It is the "image of God" given only to man and not to any other living thing on Earth.

I know, I know, I haven't quite achieved that whole "encouraging" part I mentioned earlier. So skip ahead to chapter 6: "And so after waiting patiently, Abraham received what was promised...We have this hope [of the certainty of God's promises] as an anchor for the SOUL, firm and secure."

When we accept Christ as our Savior, our spirits are immediately transformed, we become a new creation. We are immediately made right with God, because this image of Himself that He has given us is renewed by Christ's blood. Our souls, however, remain marked by our pasts, our struggles, our humanity. Our souls serve as the communication between our spiritual selves and our physical selves, and they remain part of a broken world.

Therefore, God gives us the certainty of His promises, the certainty of our salvation, as an anchor for our SOULS! When my soul wants to give up -- when my emotions fade away or my mind wanders or my desires betray the fallen human that I am -- God's faithfulness anchors my soul to Him. His Word reminds me that all of His promises will be fulfilled in His time, reminds me that my SPIRIT still allows me to approach His throne boldly even though my SOUL may fail! It is His unfailing and unchanging nature that reminds me that I AM a new creation, I AM right with Him, even when my soul feels like nothing more than a failure.

And as we hold tightly to our hope in God's faithfulness, we must simply make like Abraham and wait patiently for the fulfillment of His promises.

So as I (rather impatiently) look forward to the good and exciting things God has set forth for me in the coming year, I must simply hold tightly to the promise that God never changes. He is always changing me through His Word -- always changing His new creation to look more and more like Him -- but His own goodness and grace never change.

His love never fails.

When You Flush Your Hearing Aid

Today my patient flushed his hearing aid down the toilet.

I bet you thought this was going to be another deep or insightful blog post. It's not.

Sometimes, when all else fails, you just have to laugh. Laugh until tears run down your face and you continue to randomly burst into laughter periodically throughout the day. Because you know what? At least you didn't flush your hearing aid down the toilet.

Oh, and my poor patient? Don't worry (he sure isn't). As he told us, he has another hearing aid at home; he's always just worn one at a time because it's too expensive to wear both.

See? Always a bright side to everything.

In the Waiting

“If we let ourselves, we shall always be waiting..." - C.S. Lewis

Waiting is such a funny thing. The whole idea of waiting implies that we are anticipating something to come, anticipating a specific event or feeling or situation that we foresee as being better than our current event or feeling or situation. Yet it seems the more we wait, the further we get from what it is we are waiting for. We get so wrapped up in what's to come that we never get to what we were trying to get to at all. We simply dwell so much in the ever-elusive future that we somehow miss the present. 

I seem to be one of these perpetual waiters, always reaching for the next thing that's just barely out of my reach. I see my present circumstances as just a distraction, a waste of time, from the "better" circumstances ahead. I wait to check out my groceries, I wait in traffic, I wait for the doctors to write me orders, I wait to graduate, I wait to be married to my best friend... The list could go on for hours, but then, my friend, I would keep you waiting on the entire point of my ramblings. And that would be a dreadful waste of time. 

A few years ago, I was part of a Broadway-sized production that portrayed the life and ministry of Jesus. The production itself required two hundred cast members, a huge choir, a panel of directors, and two camels. One of the biggest things I learned was that, for the entire production to run smoothly, each person had to be in exactly their right place at exactly their right time, as determined by the director. Each person's time and place was just a little bit different, but that was their cue. And when everyone was right "on cue", the complete scene was more beautiful than anyone could have created on their own.

That is precisely what God has been showing me. My own ideas of time and place for my life seem pretty good to me, but they aren't part of the beautiful picture of salvation God is painting all around me.  It might take me years to learn, but God is teaching me what it means to live each moment for His glory, in exactly the time and place He makes for me.

Psalm 27:14 says, "Wait for the Lord; be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord." Waiting for God takes courage. He isn't one to operate on our schedules and inside our own dreams, and perhaps at the end of our lives we will find we were only waiting for the next life all along. But what would happen if, as Christians, we quit trying to dwell in the places only God can go and fully embraced this moment, this second, as if we had only this moment? God may be in our past, present, and future, but we only have right now.

So this is a record of my struggles to anticipate only heaven and to love and to live in the meantime. It is a testament to the unfailing grace of a God who invites me to a bigger story, His story, a story that requires me to submit to His time and place for my life.

And somewhere between my waiting for something better and desiring something bigger, I would say God is meeting me right On Queue.