so blessed. day seven
Today I was feeling super ambitious so I pulled out the carpet cleaner to get started on a thorough clean of our high traffic areas. And whoa. Black water. The dirt we've been living in and I didn't even know it. Gross. Also, it has definitely been determined that the remainder of my carpet cleaning is going to need to be one of those "after the kids are in bed" kind of a jobs. It was the impossibility of this chore with little ones that inspired my blessed blog tonight.
As I look back on my life, I recognize and am grateful for the things that the Lord has blessed me to "see." But I know that at times He has blessed me to "not see." My dirty carpet is one of those blessings. When my eyes are blind to the messes, I am able to enjoy this time with my young children so much more. I do not believe that ignorance is bliss, but I do believe that understanding and vision is, at times, withheld from us for our own benefit......to help us grow, to compel us to move forward with faith, to protect us, to bless us. This not only brings me peace as I make gigantic decisions with my limited experience and knowledge, but it also helps me have patience when I feel frustrated with others for just "not seeing it!" Maybe they really can't, and maybe that's just the Lord protecting and blessing them, because of course, He loves them too.
I just finished reading Our Town, a play by Thornton Wilder that I borrowed from my parent's house over Thanksgiving. A passage stood out to me that I can't help but comment about with this not seeing stuff.
"You see, we want to know how all this began- this wedding, this plan to spend a lifetime together. I'm awfully interested in how big things like that begin. You know how it is: you're twenty-one or twenty-two (ahem...nineteen! :-) ) and you make some decision; then whisssh! you're seventy: you've been a lawyer for fifty years, and that white-haired lady at your side has eaten over fifty thousand meals with you. How do such things begin?"
I'll tell you how such things began for me. We go about our days and give our all at keeping our feet planted in righteousness and He will bless us with just enough of what we need to see when we need to see it. The overwhelming prospects of what life might bring can be so paralyzing if we're looking at it all head on: lost jobs, deaths in the family, struggles to bring children into the world, struggles to get through school, struggles to keep a whole house clean with two little tornadoes running around. We can't see these things at nineteen and it will still be as impossible for us to see the future at fifty. Such things begin one faithful step into the darkness at a time. Whether it be marriage or any other momentous decision that we make in the course of our lives, our opportunities to live by faith (the "not seeing") precedes the miracle. From the outside it may look like we're going about this marriage business blindly, and, in a blessed sort of way, I suppose we are...just enough to drive us to the plunge of the Lord's crash course on developing selflessness. But our not knowing....our not having lived with our spouse before marriage or any other of the worlds many definitions of "security," ...our not knowing does not trivialize marriage. Marriage is an ordinance that we esteem the highest. How appropriate then, don't you think, that it requires such faith. Lots of blessings and miracles in store with that decision!
Ha! I promise I didn't intend for this post to be one big dissertation in defense of the "some decision" to get married, and I don't really have the brain power right now to decide or to care what Wilder really meant with his comment. Maybe just that with our limited mortal knowledge, big decisions are made lightly. Well yes Wilder, our vision is limited. Of course it is. But that doesn't mean big decisions have to be made lightly (or in our not so early 1900's Wilder world concerning marriage...not at all!) ...just made with faith. Faith is what this life is all about and there is good reason for it. Blessings. Blessings.
As I look back on my life, I recognize and am grateful for the things that the Lord has blessed me to "see." But I know that at times He has blessed me to "not see." My dirty carpet is one of those blessings. When my eyes are blind to the messes, I am able to enjoy this time with my young children so much more. I do not believe that ignorance is bliss, but I do believe that understanding and vision is, at times, withheld from us for our own benefit......to help us grow, to compel us to move forward with faith, to protect us, to bless us. This not only brings me peace as I make gigantic decisions with my limited experience and knowledge, but it also helps me have patience when I feel frustrated with others for just "not seeing it!" Maybe they really can't, and maybe that's just the Lord protecting and blessing them, because of course, He loves them too.
I just finished reading Our Town, a play by Thornton Wilder that I borrowed from my parent's house over Thanksgiving. A passage stood out to me that I can't help but comment about with this not seeing stuff.
"You see, we want to know how all this began- this wedding, this plan to spend a lifetime together. I'm awfully interested in how big things like that begin. You know how it is: you're twenty-one or twenty-two (ahem...nineteen! :-) ) and you make some decision; then whisssh! you're seventy: you've been a lawyer for fifty years, and that white-haired lady at your side has eaten over fifty thousand meals with you. How do such things begin?"
I'll tell you how such things began for me. We go about our days and give our all at keeping our feet planted in righteousness and He will bless us with just enough of what we need to see when we need to see it. The overwhelming prospects of what life might bring can be so paralyzing if we're looking at it all head on: lost jobs, deaths in the family, struggles to bring children into the world, struggles to get through school, struggles to keep a whole house clean with two little tornadoes running around. We can't see these things at nineteen and it will still be as impossible for us to see the future at fifty. Such things begin one faithful step into the darkness at a time. Whether it be marriage or any other momentous decision that we make in the course of our lives, our opportunities to live by faith (the "not seeing") precedes the miracle. From the outside it may look like we're going about this marriage business blindly, and, in a blessed sort of way, I suppose we are...just enough to drive us to the plunge of the Lord's crash course on developing selflessness. But our not knowing....our not having lived with our spouse before marriage or any other of the worlds many definitions of "security," ...our not knowing does not trivialize marriage. Marriage is an ordinance that we esteem the highest. How appropriate then, don't you think, that it requires such faith. Lots of blessings and miracles in store with that decision!
Ha! I promise I didn't intend for this post to be one big dissertation in defense of the "some decision" to get married, and I don't really have the brain power right now to decide or to care what Wilder really meant with his comment. Maybe just that with our limited mortal knowledge, big decisions are made lightly. Well yes Wilder, our vision is limited. Of course it is. But that doesn't mean big decisions have to be made lightly (or in our not so early 1900's Wilder world concerning marriage...not at all!) ...just made with faith. Faith is what this life is all about and there is good reason for it. Blessings. Blessings.
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