More Perspective

My brother sent me a nice little note after my Perspective post few weeks back, and this is an except from it.
"I also don’t think you should feel like your sufferings are small.  GOD gives people the GRACE to handle what they are faced with.  It’s not about Richard Wurmbrand or you.  With God’s grace, what he faced may have been far easier than what you face.  You just have to make sure you are bearing the cross God gave you and not some cross you have created for yourself."
I thought it was such a good point that I wanted to share, and make sure I didn't leave an unbalanced perspective. There ARE things that in the long run truly do NOT matter, and many people will look back on their lives and see that they traded their life and time for a dung heap, a pile of crap, or even "good" things that don't matter.

“Friends, why are you doing this? We too are only human, like you. We are bringing you good news, telling you to turn from these worthless things to the living God, who made the heavens and the earth and the sea and everything in them." Acts 14:15

A friend of mine gave me a bunch of very old canned goods, we're talking seven to seventeen years old, so that I could have the jars for my own canning. A huge blessing, but also a lot of work. I spent several morning up and out of the house by sun rise, emptying rotten food into a bucket to be dumped at the back of our land. A heart breaking job in many ways, and in the quiet of the morning I couldn't help but wish that the owners had shared of their vast stores, because I know there were people in their town going hungry, instead of leaving it for someone else to throw away. And I thought that's what God will do with many of our lives when we finally meet him one day. We'll stand before him with the fruit of our labors, things that in themselves are good, but we've let get out of hand and go putrid and rotten, and He'll shake his head in sorrow, knowing that all it's good for is to be taken somewhere to the back of eternity and dumped. It's easy to let even good things get out of their place.

For no one can lay any foundation other than the one already laid, which is Jesus Christ. If anyone builds on this foundation using gold, silver, costly stones, wood, hay or straw, their work will be shown for what it is, because the Day will bring it to light. It will be revealed with fire, and the fire will test the quality of each person’s work. If what has been built survives, the builder will receive a reward. If it is burned up, the builder will suffer loss but yet will be saved—even though only as one escaping through the flames. 1 Corinthians 3:11-15

In contrast we often deem things to be unimportant because they are "little", but the little things can be so critical. The Man fell in love with me and married me in part because I wore a certain shirt on a certain day. God controls and cares about all the little things in our life. In part because "little" depends on your perspective, and we don't have enough perspective to know sometimes what will make a difference. I remember I said something to a brother in the church parking lot, just in passing, about praying to God to find my keys. A long time later he told me what a big impact that comment had on him, something I forgot I said five minutes after it was done.

But I tell you that every careless word that people speak, they shall give an accounting for it in the day of judgment. Matthew 12:36

I guess that kind of strikes at the heart of these issues. My job as a Christian is to be faithful in ALL of life, in every breath, and react and respond to life in a way that lets God shine through me. It's hard. We are potty training, or as I sometimes call it, alternative diapering. They just wet their pants and I clean it up. And when it's the fifth accident for the eleventh day in a row, I don't want to react Godly any more. I want to do like Mrs. Hannigan on Orphan Annie, "Kill, kill, Kill, KILL KILL!" But when it comes right down to it the situation is not a big deal. My response is. And so are the lessons I learn, for as The Man reminded me, how many times has God cleaned up after me? Motherhood is spiritual warfare at it's best as far as I am concerned.

May God bless you with the grace, wisdom, and courage you need for today! c