Stuff...
Last night I got pretty down. Between our financial situation, the stuff with the van, and sleep issues life has been an uphill battle.

It can be difficult even in the best of times to remember that I am a son of the most high. Leigh said as she was stroking our cat Bean that she wished she was God's cat, content with the daily allotment of food and lap time that our feline friend gets. Being God's son or daughter is a lot more complex than simply being God's cat would be (assuming He has one) and as a result its benefits can be more difficult to grasp and its inherent struggles easy to see.

I've often wished for a "simpler" life, usually when I hear one of my friends bemoan their boring single lives (looking at you Pat). That's just plain wrong. I spent a lot of time this weekend listening to my children laughing and seeing their smiles. Granted I also got to hear the tears and defiance that spring up from nowhere in the lives of your typical 3-5 year old, but even that had its goodness as I got to calm them and wipe the tears away.

I work hard to try and get our head above water financially. I spend a lot of time mowing other folk’s lawns and working on their computers. That has a tendency to turn things I love (yes I enjoy mowing/weed eating) into something to be despised, but necessary. That's wrong too. I need to approach those things with the same love that I give in working for my own pleasure. I mowed my next door neighbor's yard without asking her and not even as a favor really. It was a natural extension of what I was doing already (mowing my own). That's how all work should be, including working for the kingdom.

I spend too much time looking for something I don't have or wishing for something I used to have and not enough time simply enjoying what I do have. Why is that? Well I suppose I really know the answer to that. It's what we do as humans. So here's to taking a break from that!

Mt. 6 25"Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? 26Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? 27Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?
28"And why do you worry about clothes? See how the lilies of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. 29Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. 30If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? 31So do not worry, saying, 'What shall we eat?' or 'What shall we drink?' or 'What shall we wear?' 32For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. 33But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. 34Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.  ¶
12:12 PM