Month: July 2017

For the last few years off and on I have found my self in what I can only describe as the 1950s movie The Body Snatchers. I have gone from my normal easy-going bubbly happy-go-lucky person to in brief moments of insanity becoming a conformational angry let you have it kind of person with no mercy.

I will give you an example, the other day I was singing and driving along when out of no place a car comes into my lane cutting me off and almost hitting me. Now normally I would just me grateful to have come out unscathed but no I acted like a crazed person yelling and giving  jesters that should not be used when driving, my mouth did not stop yelling angry words for minutes.  When I did take a breath I felt instant sham of my behavior. I continued driving all the while behind the person that cut me off and almost hit me and not only did they drive to the same store but parked right by me. I took longer to get out of the car because I felt horrible and just didn’t want to have to admit my wrong. I finally got out and walked up to the store but I didn’t get far because when I looked up I saw a white hair man who could hardly walk waiting for me. He smiled and apologized for almost causing an accident. Swallowing the piece of humble pie I apologized.

I will never forget that life lesson.

I know I am not alone with my actions of anger. In fact it seems that the whole world is at times nothing but anger. What if one by one we decide not to hold onto our anger and let anger rule but we start taking ownership of our anger and our actions. For every time we say or act unkind out of anger we continue the hurt and suffering of ourselves and others.

A quote that I like by an anonymous person is so true.

“Holding onto anger is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die.”

I love to garden and work in the soil or to landscape. Yes it is hard work but just to be outside with my hands in the dirt even pulling weeds, that is one of my happy places.

Years ago I worked for my in-laws in the office of their landscape company. I enjoyed the fact I could take my children to work and have a flexible schedule plus I had a friend in my brother in-law that always took the time brighten my day with a joke or to explain things and help me learn about landscaping and on one occasion I found out about a French drain. It is not named after the country but after a person that came up with an idea to use the concept of how water flows down hill. It is a slightly sloped trench filled with small rock or gravel and pipe that diverts the water away from your house or other place you don’t want to flood then is collected and used.

This basic idea of collecting water that could damage property or hurt people if not done the right way got me thinking. What if in life we have French drains when hurts happen and our tears fall.

In my life as with everyone hurt will happen and tears will fall. I have had things happen that have left me crying my river of tears. I can look back and see those tears were collected and now used for good. I know that even when life hurts my tears are seen by God I am not alone He makes a French drain that keeps me safe in the middle of what would be damaging to me but stores those tears to be used for something good later.

Psalm 56:8

You keep track of all my sorrows.
You have collected all my tears in your bottle.
You have recorded each one in your book. (NLT)

I am sure every one has heard if not played the game of Jenga. Incase you haven’t it is a game of wooden blocks. You place the blocks in a tower formation then each person takes turns removing the bottom block and putting it on top and as you can guess after some time it becomes a wobbly tower that eventually falls crashing down.

I have played this with my children when they were small and enjoyed it. Sometimes we would make up our own rules other times it was by the book. Either way it would go we would start out on the right track but at some point our tower would look like it belonged in Pisa. Our hearts would beat fast and hopes none of the blocks would come crashing done on our turn.

I was thinking of this game and reflecting on how my life can be like a big Jenga game.

I can start out putting God the first block on top. Everything is stable and going well but as life has it I then start pulling more “blocks” of life from the bottom and replace the top block with my priories and the busyness of life just keep going, block after block until my tower is so unstable my heart will race and I will start to have fear of it all coming crashing down on me. If I don’t take head to these feeling my tower crashes and I am left with pieces of what was my life.

I am learning and sometimes ever so slowly not to have my blocks of life a Jenga game but instead more like the quite but can be fun blocks of a Lincoln Logs set.