There are some days I just need a brace — those days when my back resists an upright posture. Now, everyday I need a banister as I ascend and descent the cellar steps. 

Goad to PRAYER

Balance and sure-footedness have never been constant companions. But they are more frequently AWOL in this season, spring, when I want to be putzing in the garden. 

I need support today for sure. Maybe you do, too, dear reader. 

Everywhere I look I see continuing craziness; except in the recently cleaned flower beds . . .  

There, I see the jolly waves from the winter pansies and some perennials — I even see that a potted Gerber daisy is coming back. (Or, a hearty weed )  

I am, however, a little nervous about the knock-out roses which I trimmed severely a few weeks back. 

What a brace and banister nature is — when we humans can be  unpredictably violent and merciless.  

“. . . [N]ature is very important. It is [often described] with words like glory and awe and wonder — those things that nature provides us.” Philip Yancey 

Consider the Lilies of the Field is  good advice worth remembering when the trouble presses in, eh? 

However

 Do not worry is a harder command to follow these days — as is loving my enemy when I read of what the legislators in Maryland over-rode. 

Some days, the ways in which we can defy God — or suffer from other people’s defiance overwhelms me. 

Where is God? 

The recent study in Revelation showed me He is about His business — with the horsemen and the angels; the bowls and the trumpets. 

When we read the last chapters, I had to ask myself, and out loud:

Which is easier to believe, that:

• Christ walked out of that tomb Easter morning, or

• We who believe He is Lord have a hope and a future beyond words? (John 20; Revelation 21) 

Neither — but there they are — my brace and banister today. I hope they support you. 

Holy week is a time to recalibrate — to ask GOD to recalibrate —what feels like  troubles are extinguishing.  

Frederick Buechner wrote:

Faith is better understood as a verb than as a noun, as a process than as a possession.* 

So, I checked the front window lights, a.k.a Christmas lights. They’d burned out; we replaced them. 

At night it’s nice to see light twinkle  in the dark — even as the  Christmas  is past. 

It’s a way of saying God is light, even when no one asked. 

Buechner also pointed out, according to Paul Tillich,  that doubt isn’t the opposite of faith; it is an element of faith. 

So is prayer — and gratitude: an even better brace and banister.  

And today, Lord willing, I will plant oh so many sunflower seeds.

Hoping for a return

*Quote of the Day — from Frederick Buechner 

P.S. Here is two ways  we can help in today’s troubles

— Don’t Forget to Pray!

An offer I am making to help those who are suffering in Ukraine — an OFFER 

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