This morning I breathed in the cool breeze of fall. Still dark outside, the quietness of the street greeted me with freedom. A sense lacking claustrophobia, the openness of the sky, twinkling lights above. Stars. Huge and awesome, up there, were put in the expansion of the Solar System, in a neighborhood of nothing, offering little answers, and still filled with hopeful planets. You put them there so that I may wonder, look, take in the awesome and unexplainable of what You are. You said to him, 'I will make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky' (Genesis 26:4). Oh, how lovely that You made it all just to be able to bring us an understanding of all that You do in our lives. A simple comparison of what we might be capable of, to a massive something of the unknown. Stars.
Leaving for work this morning. Who would have thought that walking outside of my front door would bring such deep thoughts to mind? This is how He works. He brings such meaning to the ordinary. To the routine mundane that is already so known, and still overlooked. To a few steps, ten feet to my car. Lugging two bags. One with the breathing treatment I must precept all day long, the other, my book bag that has become so important in my life. Carrying my Bible, journal and two more books. Filled with enriching words to help me grow internally so that I may express externally. Why does walking out to my car at four in the morning catalyst such thoughts? If it were me four years ago, I'd be hurrying. I would not have stopped to 'take in' the cool breeze. I would not have looked up to the sky, to fill my lungs with the awesomeness He is. I would have been grossly irritated with the two heavy bags, maybe it might of been just one bag. Not the book bag. Just the one with the treatment box. Maybe feelings of disgust would have overwhelmed me with anger at the thought of carrying such an item. Something to remind me of the sickness I'm plagued with. Maybe my thoughts would have been concentrated on the selfishness of ME. I'm tired. I'm sleepy. I want to jump back into bed and not have to work. I'm disabled... but I need to do this, or that. What is the purpose of my life. I'm miserable.
Oh, how I've grown. The happiness I thought I wanted turned into JOY. Joy, a goal in my being from the moment I began life. Something that kept pushing forward, don't give up. A simple yet grueling task to achieve but a feeling? But, I've learned that happiness is nothing but a FEELING, a temporary one at best. But JOY, joy is an internal life-giving organ. Something that breathes, and lives within me, nourished by my beating heart and soul. My body a temple, a home, to a God that provides constant nourishment of JOY. How could I have lived without this?
So, a simple walk outside, in the cold, transformed the rest of my day into thankfulness. For the small, and the big. The less-important to the most important. You.
Life As Lizzy
