This week my nephew shared on Facebook a photo of his 4 year old son, Oliver looking very smart and all grown-up in his new school uniform ready for when he starts school in September. Time seems to have just whizzed by since he was born. I remember holding him when he was only a few days old. He was so tiny and fragile and now suddenly he's off to school! His first tooth, his first step, his first word are all now just memories. He now chats away and absorbs new information all the time. He seems to know things about how things work and which button to press, things that take me a while to assimilate. On seeing his photo, many memories came back of my own children also and how each precious moment soon becomes a memory. It was a sharp reminder for me to cherish the present and live now to the full.
Of course not all memories are so pleasurable. Some leave scars and hurt but all are incorporated and woven into the tapestry of our lives and go to make us the people we now are today. I wouldn't be the person I now am if I hadn't had the rough as well as the smooth. But all experiences good or not so good can leave us some worthwhile lesson. You never really learn patience if you've never had to wait for anything. You don't learn about hope until you feel down. Having to live without something helps us to learn the real value and appreciate what we do have. Remembering the past is not really the problem. The real problem is when we keep dragging the past into the present. What has gone cannot be changed. It has contributed to who we are today so be thankful for it and let it go. All we have is the now. That is why we need to enjoy the now to the full because it will soon become another memory.
There are those who are always hankering after some future excitement or big thing. They spend time (and often a lot of money) going from one big conference or gathering to another and totally miss the point that God is right where we are, here and now. We don't need to go looking for him, hoping that if we can get to that big meeting, He'll show up and bless us. We are the temple of God and He resides in us. Where we are, He is. Not everyone can write like J K Rowling or J R R Tolkien. Only a few people have actually reached the moon. It would be a dysfunctional business if all the staff were managing directors. Who would actually make the goods or clean the premises? It is good to have dreams and ambitions but some miss so much because their minds are on something else, always striving. Wherever we are and whatever we do in life, God is in us and shows Himself to others through us. Theodore Roosevelt gave some very sound advice when he said, 'Do what you can with what you have where you are'.
Today is a gift - use it and fill it so that tomorrow you will have beautiful memories. Look around you whatever your circumstances and find something to make you smile. Our children may be grown and left home already, or maybe you don't have any. You can still fill your today in such a way that in the future you can look back and smile. God's will is for us to live life to the full. Here's to a future full of happy memories.
Contrasting thoughts, the ups and downs of life, you win some you lose some, disappointment and happiness, painful wounds and joyful celebration, feelings that most people have much of the time. This week we have been very happily eating the strawberry crop from our garden which this year is abundant. Some things I planted have progressed well while others have not. The potatoes and tomatoes are doing great, some carrots are growing while others - nothing!. The peas and peppers have been quite badly eaten by something - snails and ants probably, despite putting out preventative measures. I was wondering why it is that snails and ants never seem to go for the weeds in the garden but always enjoy devouring things that I have planted and which we hoped to eat ourselves. They say that thrushes and blackbirds eat snails so I thought maybe I should put up a notice in bird language, 'Free snail feast here! Chirp, chirp'. I know, I know, all are God's creatures and all that but quite honestly I don't feel the same towards the snails that eat my plants as I do towards the bees that pollinate them. Selfish of me I know. Mixed feelings - disappointment and happiness.
This afternoon I am going to a wedding. It's more than seven years now since my friend separated and finally divorced from her husband. My mind went back to those days of trauma and upset. He moved out and she kept the house so she said that in all fairness he could take what he wanted. I had said that for that first weekend when he left, I would stay over with her so she wouldn't be alone. That first night we slept on the floor - he had taken the bed! Earlier that evening we had gone to the local chippy for comfort food and we sat there for some time in the restaurant part of the shop. We went there as it was just something we didn't have to make ourselves or clear up afterwards. She talked and I listened. We did that quite a lot, her talking and me listening. But today she is getting married again - a very nice man, loving and caring. Actually they had a quiet wedding at the registry office earlier in the year and wanted to invite their friends to their home for a blessing and a time of sharing together now the better weather is here. Mixed feelings - painful wounds and joyful celebration.
You may say, that's life, and so it is. What really bugs me though is when so-called well-meaning individuals come out with things like, 'All things work together for good to those who love God', 'Time is a great healer', It'll seem altogether different in the morning'. These words are probably all true but ... ... the thing is that when you are actually going through some disappointment or trauma the last thing you want is for someone to come out with something like that. Actually what you really feel like doing is shouting at them 'Just shut up! Life sucks and I feel like crap!' Oh my goodness, you can't say that! But if we're really honest that's what we would like to say. If you sometimes feel like that, don't worry. You're in good company. The good news is that we can get angry with God and He takes it. If you're not sure about that then read the Psalms. They are full of people who blurt out their anger at God. The writer of Ecclesiastes says 'So I hated life ... ... All of it is meaningless, a chasing after the wind.' Hey, even Jesus at his crucifixion felt abandoned by God and shouted out questioning why God had left him to die alone.
Life is a bundle of mixed feelings and that's ok. It's the same for everyone and if anyone tries to say differently I for one would take what they say with a pinch of salt. They may smile (rather condescendingly) and quietly say , 'Don't worry' or offer some other unhelpful advice but that doesn't really help. If anyone is hurting you don't have to find an answer to their problems. Just walk with them for a while so they're not on their own. God can take it and He will sort it in His own way and time. Here's to life - with all its ups and downs.
