Please...do disturb.

I heard this prayer today, and was more than touched. I was, well, disturbed. Which is kind of the point, I think:

Disturb us, Lord, when
We are too well pleased with ourselves,
When our dreams have come true
Because we have dreamed too little,
When we arrived safely
Because we sailed too close to the shore.

Disturb us, Lord, when
With the abundance of things we possess
We have lost our thirst
For the waters of life;
Having fallen in love with life,
We have ceased to dream of eternity
And in our efforts to build a new earth,
We have allowed our vision
Of the new Heaven to dim.

Disturb us, Lord, to dare more boldly,
To venture on wider seas
Where storms will show your mastery;
Where losing sight of land,
We shall find the stars.

We ask You to push back
The horizons of our hopes;
And to push into the future
In strength, courage, hope, and love.

Sir Francis Drake
1577

TGIF + 4 = :-)

Five things I'm thankful for are...

1. It's almost FRIDAY.

2. Friendships that pick up immediately where they left off, no matter when that "left off" occurred.

3. Meeting new peeps!

4. When a diet finally seems to be working. Whew.

5. Answered prayers, specifically in the form of divine appointments, affirmation, and well-timed encouragement.

Raw fear.

Tonight, I am scared for the health and safety of someone I love dearly. Please keep her in your prayers. Thank you so much.

Patience is a virtue...

When I was a little girl, I had a t-shirt or poster or button for my denim jacket or something that said:
Please be patient; God isn't finished with me yet.

For the past several months in particular, I've been pretty hard on myself about some things. Not being able to predict others' actions, for one. Also, there's not having foresight to "know better" about decisions that seemed rational at the time. Etc.

A couple of dear friends have chimed in with  my mother and sister's encouragement for me to be nicer to myself. In fact, Cicily even said the other day that she wished I'd be nicer to myself in my dreams (because for a while there, I wasn't).

It occurred to me tonight that the phrase from elementary school doesn't only apply to children. At 32 9/10, God still isn't finished with this redhead yet (thankfully!). I don't have to beat myself up for not having "arrived" or not knowing the answers far in advance. I just have to pray for His will to be done, take the path that seems wisest, and learn from it all.

So RJ, please be patient. Even 1/3 (or 1/2)-way into my life span, I know for a fact that God is definitely, positively, in no way finished with me yet.

And that is so comforting!