…2And He called a child to Himself and set him before them,3and said, "Truly I say to you, unless you are converted and become like children, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven.4"Whoever then humbles himself as this child, he is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.…
To a young Child, LOVE is spelled T~I~M~E, and inside all of us is that "inner child" IF we remain connected to all that is truly important in this life...God, Country, Family, and Friends! May you be blessed with tender understanding...
In the faint light of the attic, an old man, tall and stooped, bent his great frame and made his way to a stack of boxes that sat near one of the little half-windows. Brushing aside a wisp of cobwebs, he tilted the top box toward the light and began to carefully lift out one old photograph album after another. Eyes once bright but now dim searched longingly for the source that had drawn him here.
It began with the fond recollection of the love of his life, long gone, and somewhere in these albums was a photo of her he hoped to rediscover. Silent as a mouse, he patiently opened the long buried treasures and soon was lost in a sea of memories. Although his world had not stopped spinning when his wife left it, the past was more alive in his heart than his present aloneness.
Setting aside one of the dusty albums, he pulled from the box what appeared to be a journal from his grown son's childhood. He could not recall ever having seen it before, or that his son had ever kept a journal. Why did Elizabeth always save the children's old junk he wondered, shaking his white head and rolling his eyes?
Opening the time worn and yellowed pages, he glanced over a short reading, and his lips curved in an unconscious smile and a gentle sigh exhaled through his nostrils , shaking his head. Even his eyes brightened as he read the words that spoke clear and sweet to his soul. It was the voice of the little boy who had grown up far too fast in this very house, and whose voice had grown fainter and fainter over the years. In the utter silence of the attic, the words of a guileless six-year-old worked their magic and carried the old man back to a time almost totally forgotten.
Entry after entry stirred a fire and a sentimental hunger in his heart like the longing a gardener feels in the winter for the fragrance of spring flowers. But it was accompanied by the painful memory that his son's SIMPLE recollections of those days were far different from his own. But how different?
Remembering that he had kept a daily journal of his "business activities" and all the "money that had changed hands" over the years, he closed his son's journal and turned to leave, having forgotten the cherished photo that originally triggered his search. Hunched over to keep from bumping his head on the rafters, the old man stepped to the wooden stairway and made his descent, then headed down a carpeted stairway that led to the den.
Opening a glass cabinet door, he reached in and pulled out an old "business journal". Turning, he sat down at his desk and placed the two journals beside each other. At first glance one difference was very evident. His was leather-bound and engraved neatly with his name in gold, while his son's was tattered and the name Jimmy written in crayons had been nearly scuffed from its surface. He ran a long skinny finger over the letters, as though he could RESTORE what had been worn away with time and use.
As he opened his personal "business journal" glancing over his "account" of the many transactions, the old man's eyes fell upon an inscription that stood out because the RECORD was so brief in comparison to other days. In his own neat handwriting were these words:
Wasted the whole day fishing with Jimmy. Didn't catch a thing.
With a deep sigh and a shaking hand, he took Jimmy's journal and found the young boy's entry for the exact same day, June 4th. Large scrawling letters, pressed deeply into the paper, read:
Went fishing with my Dad. Best day of my life.
I am reminded of a poem that I have in the front of a photo album from the years I had with Ryan my foster child blessing. It is called "One hundred years from now".
One hundred years from now
It won't matter
What kind of car I drove
What kind of house I lived in
How much money I had in the bank
Nor what my cloths looked like
BUT
The world may be a little better
Because, I was important
In the life of a child.
In my personal life today, relationships~albeit of the intimate romantic kind, or enduring friendships; I am finding in those too that LOVE is spelled T~I~M~E. The demise of society is adults becoming "enmeshed" in status, identity, and "business" activities almost DRIVEN BY FEAR.
This morning I sat with cup of coffee in hand in the white rocking chair outside watching the morning birds scurrying about, and the baby squirrel now almost a teen, and the delightment of the elderly orange tabby that has taken up home here since my neighbor passed away leaving him homeless nows greets ME each morning as I put a cup of food out for him.
I realized what is different about me now. I courageously asked the question "What am I more curious about than I am afraid of?".In an almost "aha moment", I realized how FEAR AND DOUBT, "together" and "ignored", will DRIVE YOU OUT OF YOUR OWN LIFE. But when we invite "them" into the layered light of awareness, they can't "join FORCES together" and RULE YOU FROM THE SHADOWS.
As I watched the the old orange tabby this morning, I imagined the WARMTH OF COMPASSION sinking into the COLD PLACE where all "fear and confusion" LIVES, as if a wood stove is lit on a frigid hard morning. The warmth from the stove fills the room, "transforming" the cold. EVERYTHING ELSE disappears, including an notion of "identity" or "roles" or "images" of who I'm SUPPOSED to be. There is only the experience of being passionately alive IN CHRIST. To possess "THAT" which sustains you when all else falls away.
In this moment, I am profoundly aware of the depth of the meaning of "worship". To many, images of Sunday mornings and singing songs of praise come to mind. This morning, in the silence, its meaning descended upon my soul..."greatness of character, honor, dignity, "worthiness and value" derived from God. Oftentimes, in being "lost" or "disconnected", we reach OUTSIDE OF OURSELVES to gain "worthiness" and try to fill that EMPTINESS with temporary "things" or "titles" or "honors" and a sense of "business activities" keeping records of "those" accounts...all which are nice but not at the expense of authentic LOVE. In this sense God is Love.
This Love is a brightnessFLOODING outward. What was once a "division" between black or white, right or wrong, evil or righteous, either and or, I now see as a gap waiting to be bridged. I want to KNOW Loves "presence", staying with what is hard until it softens, staying with what is narrow until it expands. I want to know how to float in the silences between my breathing in and exhaling and the thoughts that come in those moments FLEE FROM ACTIVITY. I want to be so comfortable WITH STILLNESS AND SILENCE that I can take "root" in them.
I want to "PURGE The Leaven" of distractions and busyness from my life and I want to MEET My Heavenly Father in that "moment", and to FEEL the accounting of Jimmy : I spent the day with My Dad and it was the BEST DAY of my life.
PEACE. BE STILL. AND KNOW THAT I AM God.
Now begin to SOURCE your life from this 'place". To GAIN your "value" from this...now this is to "worship".
Psalm 131:2
But I have calmed and quieted myself, I am like a weaned child with its mother; like a weaned child I am content.
Matthew 19:14
Jesus said, "Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these."
It's hard to have FAITH in something you are AFRAID of. And The Devil counts on this.
Matthew 7:21-23King James Version (KJV)
21 Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven.
22 Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works?
23 And then will I profess unto them, I never KNEW you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity.
In the faint light of the attic, an old woman, short and stooped, her tiny frame bent made her way to a stack of books that sat near one of the little half-windows. Brushing aside a wisp of cobwebs, she opened one particular book toward the light and began to carefully read. Eyes once bright but now dim searched longingly for The Source that had drawn her here. It began with the fond recollection of a once safe time in her life at the feet of her Grannie and her Grannies' God, long gone and lost somewhere in adulthood and judgment but she hoped to rediscover.
Opening the time worn and yellowed pages, she began to read, and her lips curved in an unconscious smile and a gentle sigh exhaled through her nostrils , shaking her head. Even her eyes brightened as she read the words that spoke clear and sweet to her soul. It was the voice she had almost forgotten, and whose voice had grown fainter and fainter over the years.
Entry after entry stirred a fire and a sentimental hunger in her heart like the longing a gardener feels in the winter for the fragrance of spring flowers. But it was accompanied by the painful memory of those days far different from now. But how different?
In the utter silence of the attic, the words "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever will believe upon Him shall have everlasting life" worked their magic and carried the old woman back to a time almost totally forgotten... a time when she couldn't feel this LOVE, but only CONDEMNATION.
~John 6:35 Jesus wept. ~
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