Majestic or Magic?

Hello Friend!

How is your week going?  Still standing?

After neglecting my email for a couple of weeks, I am sitting down to organize hundreds of notes that have piled up since I last sorted and filed.  It’s taken about 15 years, but I am finally becoming overwhelmed by this form of correspondence.  Email is such a mixed blessing.  Consequently, I’m on a quest to figure out what to do with all the digital dithering I create. 

Don’t tell me to create folders either! It doesn’t solve anything.  Because then I need to go through the folders in order to determine what is relevant, which puts me back in the same place. When you have folders, you merely provide headings for your incompetency sessions.  Is the student list from my daughter’s algebra class 3 years ago important?  What about the letter I got from my friend when she was in Europe?  Will she ever want to remember that she had to leave the table at her second cousins wedding to vomit in a potted plant after she drank aquavit for the first time?  How on earth does one solve such problems?

(Ok, clearly the letter about aquavit is a keeper.  No question. I will need to have her for dinner soon and bring that one out: transfer friend’s letter to “things to do soon” folder.)

I’ve tried denial and avoidance, but neither is working and I’m becoming desperate.  I’ve also been praying for the rapture, some might call that misdirected but I took that up in order to survive this next election cycle. 

It reminds me a bit of my daughter’s friend, who after saying grace at lunchtime, closed with “in Jesus’ magical name. Amen.”  Such a mix up caused shrieks of delighted laughter around the table.  “Majestic!!” The sweet teen corrected herself, “majestic, not magical, wow!  That’s bad.”

Ever been there friend?  Ever been tempted to ask God to wave a magic wand over your life?

Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.  And the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Phil 4:6-7

When procrastination finally gets around to catching up with me, I am tempted to ask Jesus for magical solutions.  I’m not interested in asking for wisdom, I want answers to float down from the heavens.  I’m not interested in glorifying God, only making my life easier.  I’m not interested in talking with the Lord, I’d rather tell Him what I want him to do.

Can I encourage you this week friend, to spend some time in prayer?  As we head into fall, have an old fashioned prayer meeting and bring before the Lord some of those issues that sit in the corner of your mind.  Pray with your spouse, even if it’s weird.  Phone a friend and place a prayer request.  Better yet, ask someone face to face for prayer and then stand there awkwardly.  Expectantly….  If they say, “Now?” Say, “Heck yes!”  Complete the whole uncomfortable experience by grabbing their hands and closing your eyes.  Maybe you could start humming Kumbaya My Lord.   

(Ok, that one might be too far, but I would LOVE IT if you pulled that off.  It is my favourite song.)  

I have seen God do amazing things when I step out in faith and embarrass myself. 

Be safe this Halloween week.  Wear bright clothing.  Harvest sugar products from your pagan friends – or not – get out in your community and make a difference. 

I’m praying for you,

xoxKaren  

Lily Work

And upon the top of the pillars was lily work: so was the work of the pillars finished. 1 Kings 7:22

Hello Friend!

I’ve missed you, how are you? 

It’s been a prayerful few weeks since my last entry.  I've reflected upon the goodness of God and the fragility of life.  Spending time with fancy hospital machines made me contemplative and I found myself walking hallways late at night to pass time.  I shouldn’t have been up but I was running on adrenaline and thought laps around courtyard might still my mind.  I was on lap 4 when I had an honest to goodness late night revelation. 

I don’t like cupcakes.

It still makes me sad to confess it but it’s true.  Not that I dislike cupcakes, I just don’t prefer them.  To me, they are a bit dodgy.  Not confident enough to identify as a cake, they feel the need to hide behind copious amounts of frosting.  It makes me suspicious of the little beggars.  They were first heard of around 1790 and were baked off in tea cups (another sin) as muffin tins hadn’t been invented.  Since then, they have hung out at gatherings defeating dieters through the centuries. 

Not long ago, the food world went cupcake crazy.  Gourmet cupcakes started making appearances in bakeries and before long the internet was inundated with the things. Not just pictures but entire websites dedicated to the art of baking and icing cupcakes. Gone were the days of chocolate and vanilla, driven out by such flavors as pistachio, salted caramel, and green tea wasabi.  Suddenly, perfectly normal women lost their minds and became intent on building objects out of fondant and frosting.  Like my life wasn’t hard enough, without feeling I needed to spend hours sculpting Disney’s latest tutu-clad-abomination, dancing across key lime grass procured by a #233 Wilton tip.

Yet some people are what I call "lily work" people. People who are able to spend lavish amounts of time on precise tasks, without going crazy.  I am not a lily work person.  I am the bulldozer type, but I have seen lily work people in action and they are amazing.  Like my girlfriend who, without being asked, decided she would make party favors for a friends 75^th birthday celebration. She did her research and created a red cookie (symbolizing luck) and decorated it with a Chinese character denoting longevity.  Red dye, cookies, time, chocolate, characters, gold dust, more time, generosity, and attention to detail combined to create a delightful favor for 50 guests.  The birthday boy felt blessed.  It was lovely. If you had handed me the assignment, I would have stuck a red M&M to a fortune cookie and hoped for the best. 

The Old Testament doesn’t talk about cupcakes, which is a blessing, but I have found some wonderful references to artistry there.  The instructions for building the temple were precise and the Lord assigned gifted workers to specific tasks.  There were timbers to be hewn, rocks to be cut and beams to be raised.  However, what always strikes me were those who were called to the more ornate tasks in the temples construction.  Walk through 1 Kings 7 and see if you don’t agree.  Equally important to the establishment of the pillars, was the “lily work” crafted to display God’s glory.  Lily work was the ornate decoration that God instructed was to adorn the temple.  It required time, skill and devotion. Sometimes, my utilitarian nature scoffs at such extravagance, yet God mandated it.  

I was thankful for the gift of lily work last month as a skilled surgeon wound his way through tiny arteries and vessels, into ventricles to mend my daughters heart.  Again and again, my life has been touched by the thoughtfulness of those who bless others with lily work.  A card when I was blue, a meal when I was exhausted; all glorious expressions of God’s care and thoughtfulness. Is there any small tasks that you have left undone because it seems insignificant? I can assure you, that if the Lord has placed it in your mind, it is too big to ignore.  Friend you have no idea the beauty this lily work adds to a life. Be lavish with your time this week and generous with your love.  The Lord finds it beautiful.      

I'm praying for you this week,

xoxKaren