Pictures- I love them. I take them. I put them on my wall on canvas. I send them to people in the mail. I copy them. I have them on my phone. Pictures are just special. It’s not so much the picture but what I represents. I have an album on my phone that says friends. In that album are pictures of people. In our culture today we have what we call , “selfie’s”. That’s when you take a picture or yourself and often it’s because you want a picture or two people together and you don’t have anyone else to take the picture. There is something about a picture together with a friend that is special. We were somewhere one day, okay we were getting a pedicure and it wasn’t Jim as a part of the “we” and a family came over and asked if we would take their picture. They wanted to remember the moment they did something special together. I was glad to oblige. I had asked many people to do that for me.
What is there about a picture? It’s a reminder. It brings back memories. It’s a point in time that is etched in the heart. I wonder if Jesus and the disciples would have done a selfie, what those pictures would have looked like. Peter probably making a face, John close to Jesus, Andrew laying across the front on the group, Philip standing tall in the back and Thomas seemingly never looking at the camera at the right time. Pictures reveal a bit about ourselves. Sometimes we are okay with it and other times we beg people not to show that picture to anyone. Life won’t change- we will just discover other ways to do selfie’s. And as we look back at the picture we have taken we remember. Make sure you live life that’s worthy of the selfie’s that find their way to your camera. And when people look at it , let them have memories of the sweetest kind. And if you could take a selfie with Jesus where would it be? Curious minds want to know.
It was one of the many we saw on our recent trip. I have a hankering for a windmill at the farm but haven’t gotten the farmer to believe in my dream. Last year, however, I found a piece of iron sticking out of the ground. It wasn’t unusual for us to find interesting things sticking out of the ground, but then comes the remove it moment. It wouldn’t budge. That’s when the farmer looked at the surroundings, the well, and said, “here is a piece of the old windmill.” After digging down several inches trying to get it to move, and it firmly planted in place, it was decided to cut it off, with a blow torch kind of thingee, and replace the dirt and the sod. I really didn’t want to hit it with the lawnmower, and the farmer definitely didn’t want me hitting it with the lawn mower. It, the heavy piece of steel would have won. So, windmills: I think they are beautiful. They reflect the sun, they bring beauty to a forsaken landscape and they bring water up to the surface. It’s a visual of the past, a reminder that wind is energy and a challenge to find a windmill to put up at the farm. Windmills remind me of what God does. Wind can be damaging and wind can be calming. A cool breeze on a hot day is refreshing. The wind during a blizzard in Minnesota stops the world from it’s normal schedule. And yet, the wind catches the paddles of a windmill and turns them which in turn rotates gears and shafts and brings up water from the earth. Windmills are high in the breeze and bring those needing water from afar. Cattle figure out pretty quick the windmills aren’t there just to look cute in a picture. Cattle find their way to the water.
I look at the windmills and wonder how many stories could it tell, it it were able to? It doesn’t do much but go with the wind. The wind though harmful can be, is needed to draw water. I sometimes feel the wind on my face in life and deny it’s valuable assets to my heart. I want the water, but don’t want the wind to blow. I want the cool breeze, but I don’t want the gusts that shake the trees. I can’t have it one way or the other. I will take what God gives and enjoy for the moment the breeze or the shutters flapping. For in each, I can learn to be content and see what God is doing in my life. Drawing water or shaking out dead branches!
It started it sleet and rain. I wasn’t going anywhere anyway so it didn’t matter. But as it has happened before: the snow didn’t happen. Whether it just stalled or the meteorologists got too excited about the possibility of a storm, the rest of the day didn’t pan out like they thought.
It’s not just the weather that doesn’t happen like we thought! Life has a way of happening and it’s NOT the way it had been forecast. But God said, but He promised, but it’s supposed to be, and it’s not. I listened to the rain hit the roof today and wanted snow. I looked it the window looking for snow and nothing. I look at the plans I thought and they aren’t happening. Of course we blame the weatherman when the weather doesn’t pan out. And of course I blame God when my heart plans don’t pan out. Yet, I have everything I could possibly need. Lord remind me that sometimes I think too much. Remind me to rest in who you are and not the fantasies I invent in my head.
It’s New Years Eve. We don’t have many traditions with holidays and definitely not with New Years Eve. It’s just another night and I don’t stay up late any night so won’t be watching the new year come in. Tonight, could be different.
There is something about watching something leave that you are frustrated with that gives one a feeling inside of satisfaction. When we bought our cabin there were lots of “stuff” left there. Did I want it? NO! So Tyler had a fun day of burning junk. It felt good to watch it burn. We had a couple old chairs that had been around since 1810. They were worthless. They got burned. Even a car or two that we sold, especially one that had bad memories for me, was nice to watch it go out the driveway. Repainting a wall that was an awful green color, giving away the old corduroy jeans I found in Jim’s closet when we first got married. (Well I did wait a year and when he hadn’t wore them, they left) There is something rewarding about watching the things that trouble you leave.
This year has been a trial. In many ways it’s been a year of challenge, mole hill turned mountain issues and that doesn’t even count Covid. It’s been a year of change, some good, some good turned sour, and trials that stress the heart. This is normal in life. The little rain that must fall quote, kind of turned into torrential downpours. And yet, if I hadn’t told you that, you may have never thought that life was a challenge. We were taught to make lemonade out of lemons. Figure out a way to deal with the stuff that gets in your way and most of all, find good you can do when you feel like crying. There will come the tears. We have buried several people this year that were special. It wasn’t Covid for most of them, it was life which eventually brings death. That’s not a surprise. Before 2020, people died. We all are. It’s how you handle the transition. Perhaps one of my favorite memories of the year involved a funeral and a burial high on a hill in Wisconsin. For you see amid tears, there are some beautiful things waiting to be seen if you don’t let the tears from looking up. I know it’s hard to cry and look up. Tears make everything look blurry. However, Psalm 126:5 reminds us that if we sow with tears we will reap with joy. In my limited way of seeing life, I know that when tears come the soil of my heart is moistened and I feel deeper, reach out to people and love more. Tears are like a fertilizer to grow toward each other.
So this year, I may stay up tonight and see the New Year in, or I may just fall into bed like we did last night, tired. We put a ceiling up in our newly vaulted room and we were tired. Today we finish the ceiling and start on the floor. The 21 packages of flooring are in the back of the truck sitting in the shop waiting! I may make a list of my top 20 things for 2020, and then maybe I won’t. Maybe I will make a list of the 20 things I have learned from 2020. I may find 20 pictures I took that make me go “ah” or I may just look at the calendar and say maybe next year. What I know I will do is to be thankful that I in the midst of a pandemic, have a faith and a future. Faith that walks me hand in hand with the creator of the universe, and a future that gives me hope that it’s not about what happens down here that defines me, but that God calls me his child.
Oh yes, and I have instead of cool dice hanging from my rear view window, I have masks! That pretty much defines the year with the variety I have dangling to remind me when I leave the car take one. It doesn’t work: more times than not I walk back to my car to get one when I get to the door of Kwik Trip, but I am not alone. The lady with her sweatshirt pulled up in an odd position reminds me we are all in this together and laughing at the everyday things we find in life somehow makes traditions, troubles, trials and tears a little bit easier!
I can hear the wind. I can feel the snow hit the windows and see the faint glow of the light up the road snow blustering all around it. It’s Christmas Eve, Eve. We make so much of a holiday that really doesn’t mean much. We make it mean a lot and I love every minute of it but really, does Jesus want us to wait in anticipation for the morning of his birthday on this earth to arrive? We make the best of it, this wonderful tribute to the birth of the Messiah but what would Jesus say? About my 9 foot tree, my fussing to wrap gifts and make special surprises for people? Does he even have an opinion and would I want to know what he thinks about the fuss we make here below. The theology in most of the Christmas carols is errant; beautiful melodies but probably far from the truth and yet, we celebrate. Why? Because even though Santa and frosty have their claim, people still see the baby in the manger and think about God. They sing the carols and think about God. They buy presents to show they love people and that very much reflects God. They share and find more kindness in their day- a wonderful way to honor God. So if something so out of the box can bring us back to thinking about, singing about and acting like God, do it. It’s quiet for a moment and the winds begin to blow again. It will be a quiet Christmas: our Covid Christmas. It will be a blessing because for another day people will turn towards God. Sometimes that’s all God needs to get their attention. Then the Holy Spirit starts to work in their heart all because of the tree, the carols and the crèche. Enjoy the beauty. I am in the quiet with just the wind to talk to me. It’s very soothing in an odd way.
Special Touch Ministry 