Tuesday, October 19, 2010

Exerpt from "Confessions of a Prayer Wimp" by Mary Pierce

   Clear some time in your schedule, some time to do nothing...to just think.  Life is simpler when you know our purpose.  Why are you here?  A friend says it doesn't matter why we are here or what we do, because a hundred years from now, nobody is going to know the difference. 
   Decades ago Robert Frost wrote his poem "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening."  Reading it today, I am moved by his words, by the picture of a man and his horse, stopping in dark, wintry stillness to "watch the woods fill up with snow."  He longs to stay there but remembers that he has "promises to keep and miles to go before he sleeps."  Just like me.  His decision to stop and watch the snow, and to write about it, matters to me today.  My pessimistic friend is wrong.  Almost a hundred years later, Frost makes a difference.
I want a simple life with uncluttered space to put the most important things first in my schedule.  I want to wake up thankful for life and breath and health.  I want less confusion and more calm, less stress and more sanity.  Each day is a gift, a fresh chance to love people.  I want the time, the space, and the energy to do that.

I want more time to watch the woods....

   In another moment, I know, I'll have to get back to those promises I have to keep and the miles I must cover before I sleep.  But for this moment, I close my eyes, feeling God's presence and peace, thinking about how a hundred years from now, what I do today might be making a difference in someone's life, somewhere out there in time.  But for now, I sit and smile.  This is my moment in the sun.

"Now this is what the LORD Almighty says: 'Give careful thought to your ways.'"  Haggai 1:5

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