For Now

 So many times I berate myself over social media. It can be a stealer of time, reading articles on Twitter or keeping up with friends on Facebook. I have Instagram, but hardly give it a look because it is just one more thing. The joy of social media is keeping up with friends and now living in another state, so far away, I would miss out on celebrations, those in need of prayer and many good laughs. Yesterday morning, I was especially thankful for Wifi and the technology that comes with it all. I was able to Zoom with my former Sunday School, Life Bible Study, class. My friend Dena who has faithfully taught in Dayspring for twenty years, is retiring....for now. She knew the Lord's leading for her to step down from teaching, for now. So, it was wonderful, for now, to be able to participate in that Sunday morning class. Dena is one of the best teachers and my Bibles are filled with notes in the margins from her lessons over the years. We have been friends for almost twenty years, about the same time when she began teaching in our class. After her lesson, when she shared her decision to step down, she went through a few memories that we have shared as a class. She mentioned her surprise 50th birthday party at Peggy's. We got her there, barely, under the guise of the party being for Carolyn's birthday. Y'all, I was so nervous that she would decide at the last minute not to go and that can always be a factor for this friend who cherishes her down time, alone. Thankfully, she rode with Roy and me out to Peggy's house and she certainly was surprised as church friends, work friends and family gathered to celebrate her monumental birthday. 

My Bible is falling apart, which is a good and bad thing. Good, because that is a sign of being well used but bad, finding one to replace it. I have one in the wings and when I read from it yesterday I realized that something was missing. I am a center reference column reader. Not so much that I use it but because it makes an ease on the eyes for reading. the turquoise Bible was not going to be the one. Dang, cause it is so cute.  I began the search online yesterday afternoon. Neither Amazon nor Barnes and Noble had what I was looking for. I did a Google search and lo and behold, I found what I was looking for at Target and Lifeway. I went with Target because of free shipping and a discounted price. Lifeway was about $10.00 more and $6.99 shipping to boot. This is partially why the selling part of Lifeway has done badly in the past few years and closed all their stores. Lifeway came out this week with a rebranding, with the W now not being capitalized and the i with a tear away look or something. Deep down inside for me, Lifeway is still The Baptist Bookstore. My favorite Baptist Bookstore was by South Main Baptist Church in Houston. Lifeway stores of the recent past had way too much Jesus Junk in them. There was a sleek but cold atmosphere in the stores. It never felt inviting to browse. In fact, when we had the store in Asheville, it was a stop of last resort. 

Yesterday morning, the verse from Proverbs 4:23 rolled around on the inside of me. Guard your heart. Sometimes the verses that become plaques, or plates or platitudes gets lost in the familiarity. We can regard verses like that with a yea, been there, done that kind of attitude. They might be memory verses that have just been that, a memory verse to get a star on a poster or to rebrand that thought, a notation on an Excel spread sheet. Guard your heart. Last week while delivering some things to friends, social distancing of course, Kelly and I talked about not going stir crazy as we hunker down during pandemic times. Mainly, I have unfinished projects and work occupy a lot of time and since I have slowed down just a bit, they take longer to accomplish. But, there are those days, if I don't watch it, contemplations can quickly turn into taking way too much attention and that is when guarding my heart kicks in. It is a literal thing, stress brings on afib and a spiritual thing. Guard your heart above all else, for it determines the course of your life. 

On this rainy day, with pewter gray skies, my neighbors huge tree stands against this steely color. The branches are empty of leaves long ago fallen to the ground. Some think dreary, but I think hope, because against the dreary, in spite of the rain, there is life flowing deeply within that tree. Resting for the upcoming seasons when trees truly are on display, budding, blooming and sustaining until those cool fall days cause the leaves to turn and fall. I don't sit here and worry that the there isn't life over there, that buds aren't showing, yet. It makes me think in this quiet January time, when life slows a bit, nothing too showy going on, is there life teaming within getting ready for the upcoming seasons? I remind myself quite often these days not to be like a stunted shrub in the desert, Jerimiah 17:6. 

Being a fence sitter, this house is perfectly placed for a fence sitter. Sitting in the living room I can see the north skies that are seen from the back of the house and then I see the southeast from the front of the house. North skies can be clear, almost blue but a quick glance to the southeast holds dark skies and clouds. Yes, as a fence sitter, the views are adequate to continue fence sitting. 

I will leave this post with a Dena story. Dena was moving from an older apartment to a brand new, building of apartments, set in a park like setting. Parking garage so as not to worry about flooding when the rains came. Roy and I stepped into her old apartment to help her begin sorting and moving the smaller things that the movers would not be transporting. Roy about shook her to the ground when he asked, "what can I throw away?" At the end of cleaning up the old apartment with the big things moved already, there was a small pile of stuff. Dena gives great contemplation to these kinds of things and in the pile was an old globe that had been her sister's globe for use in junior high school. Her older sister mind you. Dena called her sister to see if she wanted the globe...that would be no, she hadn't thought about it since junior high school. Dena handed us the globe and said, don't tell me what you do with it. Well, we held onto it because I knew it could be of some use in the future. Dayspring had a apartment warming for Dena. Becky S and I had a plan for that globe. Becky decorated it, wrapped it up and gave it to her at the party. We had made it into a guest globe instead of giving her a guest book. When friends came over, they could sign the globe which turned out to be quite fun because Dena had international guests in her home from time to time. The look on Dena's face was priceless when she unwrapped and saw the globe. Maybe there was a bit of relief too, since it had not met a garbage ending but had been rescued and repurposed.