Author: marettej

We want to be… fine. We want to tell people fine when they ask how we are. We want to mean it. We don’t want to lie but it makes it easy to lie rather than tell the truth . Fine sounds so easy to say. One syllable. It rolls off your tongue. Doesn’t even need to go through your brain. It’s a simple and easy answer and they move on to ask the next person how they are . We want to be fine. It’s easier to be fine than to be vulnerable. To be fine just means you have to fake it. To be vulnerable means you have to be honest, it may hurt and it might cost you some pride and a scab may get ripped off a cut on your heart. I want others to be fine too. Being fine means being done with the conversation and that means I can move on to other things and not get caught up in their problems. I am fine. Such a nice answer to give.

It is my day to run errands. It’s been a crazy week of horse day camps. One of the blunt facts is we need more cowboy boots that are small sizes and preferably not girlie ones. Little boys haven’t seen the ads that real men wear pink. They really don’t think it’s cool to wear pink cowboy boots. I began my day sleeping in. I didn’t mean to, bur guess I needed it. That threw off my God time and I told a God we were going to have to spend the day on the run and I would do my study and meditation tonight but oh by the way I needed to find some small cowboy boots. End of discussion! Errands began. Second stop was a thrift store. I went to the kids shoe section and saw a nice pair; $4.49. Happy! Then I saw another pair. Same size, nicer boot but when I turned it over the price was $13.99. I put it back. I walked around and looked for the perfect boot, the right size and had to keep coming back to this boot. Actually the only Childrens boot that resembles anything cowboy at all. I looked at the price and heard God saying, “you just said you needed boots; ignore the price.” I told God what I wanted. He kept his bargain. I found something wrong with his answer to my prayer. I picked up both pair and went to check-out. I probably do that in more than just cowboy boots. I ask God, then when he answers I find something wrong with his answer to my request. I need to pick up the boots more often and just check-out….

Its really hard to make some choices. Some choices are pretty simple and easy to make. Like, where do you want to eat? Or, chocolate or vanilla ice cream? Where do you want to go on vacation or who should we invite for dinner? But then there are some other choices that make life a bit more of a challenge…like, smile when someone snaps at you, or not say anything when the words are being thrown at you and they are not true. And then, Jesus says something that can be interpreted like the above…choose to find joy in the journey set before you. I can choose to gripe, I can choose to worry or I can choose to find joy. It doesn’t really chance the journey but it does change my heart. It’s much harder than it sounds. It’s much harder than it looks and it’s much harder when it’s my journey and not me telling someone else to choose the joy. But, it is a choice….to choose joy…

I sat by the fire and talked about life to a friend. One of the questions we asked was what if church was where people could be open and ask each other how life was and we all felt comfortable enough to tell the truth. Now it seems to be don’t ask me how I am and I won’t tell you.

Attention, all! See the marvels of God! He plants flowers and trees all over the earth, Bans war from pole to pole, breaks all the weapons across his knee. “Step out of the traffic! Take a long, loving look at me, your High God, above politics, above everything.”

Psalm 46:8 – The Message

My verse for the day. And as I read and ponder, my view for the day.

Beauty: Gods beauty. It isn’t hard to see God in his creativity. It isn’t hard to see God in the way he moves the clouds and stirs the water. It’s pretty easy to see God in a wee baby… especially when they look at you with wonder. It’s the stepping out of traffic that I sometimes have a problem with. I love to travel. I could easily be packed and ready to go in 2 minutes if someone said, “do you want to go?” I am not sure why I love to go. But what I don’t love is along the way somewhere in the midst of ecstasy, beauty and adventure is traffic. I spent part of last week in Denver. Denver has traffic. If you have to go anywhere north and south or east and west you probably have to encounter I25 and in the dictionary when you look it up there is a picture of traffic beside the word. Traffic irritates even the calmest of people. We all want to know why we are sitting still or crawling at a speed I could actually walk faster than. Horns honking, people losing their bodily control and waving hands at you that by the look on their face you interpret as not happy campers. People trying to get into your lane, others not slowing enough, fender benders, people keeping you from merging into their lane and eternity looming with us sitting perturbed. We don’t handle traffic well.

So the things we don’t handle well, God uses as illustrations so we get the picture. God says, ” step out of the traffic.”

If you remember your last traffic jam, getting out isn’t always easy. Getting out also means you lose your place in line: the very line you are silently calling names and tapping your foot at.

If we were like God, we could be above the traffic and see the accident. We could see the pile up with 2 very upset people. We could see the stuff that gets us so worked up. Admit it; I am not the only one who doesn’t like traffic jams.

God is simply trying to get me to see the bigger picture. Sometimes stepping out of the traffic or life is when God can talk to us. It’s a time when other things aren’t taking away our attention from God.

I had the wonderful opportunity this past week aside from the traffic to sit on the couch and visit with old friends, sit in the mountains in a hot tub and watch the sunset and see Baihley get her Masters Plus Degree from Denver University. To do those things I had to endure the traffic of life. But when I stepped out of the traffic God gave me a few ” ahh” moments with him. The key is recognizing when God is saying step out and then doing it. May you find traffic a bit less stressful and may you step out of the traffic long enough to take a long, loving look at God and what he is trying to tell you.