Calling all cry-babies! It is I! Your leader!

SOMETHING happened! It was terrible! Down right awful! I was at the place doing my thing when you know who walked in and stomped all over my day! WHAT happened is not important, all you need to know is, I didn't like it. Leaving the place I'm feeling blue. In the car blue turns to BLACK and arriving home to an empty house morphs black into ugly despair which all but demands to be let out! Calling my husband at work I release my story on him and wait impatiently for it to draw the response I want. NO! The response I NEED to feel better, to continue my day! The silence is tense, but the "hmmm" that follows is painfully inadequate and only adds to my swelling furry. "You're no help! Why can't you say something useful?" I'm outraged that he won't give up the words of comfort! Why won't he just say what I need to hear? He should KNOW what I need to hear! After all, he is my husband. Giving up on forcing it out of my other half, I speed dial my sister, my beautiful, therapeutic, great listener of a sister! Being 5 years older than myself, she usually knows what it's like to GO through whatever I'm GOING through and gives the best advice on GETTING through. She picks up with a curt "YES?" Oh no. I can hear the kids screaming at one another, I hear her husband asking her who's calling, I hear her neighbor greeting her from the door as she breezes right in. I hear my sister make a defeated groan and whisper "Can we talk later?" right before I hear the *CLICK*. Another dud. I'm pathetic enough that if she were avaliable, I WOULD call my mother just to get this out. But sadly for me, she's out of town and won't be calling me until much later tonight. Boy did she doge a bullit! I need to talk NOW! Sitting on the couch seething about the general state of the world, mine especially, I'm feeling dissapointment on top of anger, saddness on top of the new arrival, lonliness. Even though I know they are human, imperfect and incomplete, I still count on them to fulfill my needs, whatever my needs, whenever I need them. WHY am I so dense? Because I'm the silly brown moth, diving for the light I think I need and only drowning myself in the process. Dosn't God promise me that he will never fail? Did he not say that he will never leave me nor forsake me? Isn't he the great provider? These things are all true but slippery thoughts to hold onto when I'm floundering on Earth's surface with real and urgent needs while God graces his "throne above." The only way I'll ever learn to trust God, to take to him my aches and pains of daily living and truely leave them at his feet, the only way to have my needs fulfilled by the one being capable is to build my releationship with Him. I must learn to pray more and wail less. There is no deeper meaning here, only internal frustration at my own unwillingness to live like one who is SAVED. It is as if I turn my face away from God and say "No thank you Lord. I've got this. I don't need your grace or power. I'm a mighty human!" What a mighty silly human I am. Today I thank God for being REAL, for being present and tangible in my life on the days I have enough sense and awareness to let him.

Why does the male moth get all the colors?

Floating with my husband in the community pool at midnight, I'm captivated by a large brown moth carving measured patterns in the air above us. Closer and closer she dances towards us, trying to sneak past our mysterious forms to the beautiful warm glow that is the underwater pool lighting. I can almost envision the grin on her tiny triumphant face as she finally comes close enough to dive towards her goal. "What a clever moth I am!" I mock aloud as we bear witness to her almost victory. WHAM! The impact our ears cannot hear rocks her small body and now I can see the panic, the terror as she flaps and splutters in the deadly monsoon sized ripples our bodies have made. Not willing to watch her drown I grab my rescue apparatus, an abandoned pair of goggles, and compassionately fish her out. What a joy, what a sweet and simple relief to see her gradually dry her wings and take flight again above us! I love watching her in these slow hypnotic patterns, in WHAM! She's in the pool again! Struggling now not only against the waters heavy soaking weight, but also exhausted from her recent brawl with this same enemy. A bit amused, I lift her to safety once again, this time much further away from the irresistibly wet grave she so obviously craves. An hour later, as I'm dragging my endearingly "child-at-heart" husband from the pool, I spot my moth. "This is how you thank me!?" Huffy and annoyed I walk away from the doomed creature who apparently will not learn self preservation skills even in the face of certain death. My husband laughs at my pouting and cannot understand my frustration. "Over a moth? Why is it such a tragedy to lose one when there are a million others just alike?" Much later, as I collapse gratefully into bed, into my loving husband's waiting arms, it occurs to me that I'm the insignificant moth who might never learn. I'm the silly moth Lord, and you're my patient savior. There are trillions others just like me, many who could do my job, who could rent my apartment, who could walk my dog. There are even a few who could love my husband and a few more who could complete my family. Although I'm one of many, a grain of sand on the beach, you love me enough to know why I'm worth saving again and again and again. How grateful am I that the one God sent to rescue me from sin and death is not as easily thwarted as me, but forever powerful, forever merciful, forever in love with me. Today I praise God for his patience, without which I would be a thing marked for death, a woman awaiting my turn to drown.