Day Four

I came downstairs early this morning and went into the bathroom to put my contacts in. Standing on top of the toilet to see in the mirror, Jacklyn was brushing her hair, and she gave me this funny look.

I smiled at her, getting another funny look.

"Did you wake up on the wrong side of the bed this morning, dear?" I asked.

"Actually," she began, "I meant to wake up on the wrong side, but ended up waking up on the right side instead!" :-)

I did something absolutely terrible--oh the guilt. You see, there's something about Pillsbury brownies. There are things you just buy generic brands of because of the good deal and the little (if any) difference in taste/quality/function. However, when you discover the difference between generic brownies and Pillsbury brownies...you've gone beyond saving (on more levels than one! $$$)! And ever since then, my brother Justin--who doesn't really like to cook all that much outside of Ramen noodles and microwavable things--has been the brownie-bakin' King.

So Justin made this wonderful batch of brownies that sit innocently on the stove for the random plucking. Who cares if it's near suppertime...Jen wonders to herself, what would these taste like with a little peanut butter spread on the bottom???

Okay, lt's skip the crime of peanut butter and chocolate in the same sentence and get to the fact that I ate three of them. Yes. Three. Swing the gavel, diet is doomed. You should try this, for it was delighful in heavenly proportions...and guilt loves company. :-)

Today you shall have two pictures, because I had something happy to share.

I couldn't find a place in the house for a little bit of solitude, so I decided to brave the yucky day and go out! I walked down the road a ways, and lo and behold...an easter lily bloom. :-) A little bunch of them! So I pull the handy-dandy camera from my hoodie pocket and take a picture of the little thing ready to burst from it's bonds. As I walked back to the house, I took the long way around, noticing my forgotten and neglected flowerbed. Poor thing...I'd pretty well left it to the weeds last fall and didn't even get them covered before it snowed. But still, the irises have popped a good 6 inches from the soil and the gladiolas are poking their heads out--all as if to look at their little-failure-me and say, "Hi. We'll give you another chance." :-)

Look at that bloom. Around the beautiful blossom itself is layer after layer of hard, green, shell. If you feel the outside, it doesn't feel like the velvety softness of a lily petal...it feels more like beetle armor! But before the beauty and sweetness of this little life can be witnessed in awe, it's has to break forth through layers....one layer to the next layer, until it's a soft, glorifying, refined little life. Though nothing...nothing but the strength the Lord places in that blossom, can peel the layers back for her. :-) She just has to accept the very strength her Maker has offered her by nature.

I shake my head, my friend. Life has so many layers. What layer are you facing right now? I'm encased in the beetle shell, working on this particular layer of my heart. And when I feel the most hopeless, pressing in my own strength against my circumstances, it's when I fall back weary and oh-so-ready for Him to take over that I begin to see the sunshine between the folds. Notice it's after the surrender?

May your day, and the rest of your week, be enveloped in this beautiful fact: We need Him. All of Him. Like that bloom, by nature we need His strength. We were formed with that need, so that nothing in the world could fill it but Himself. :-) "When we find ourselves most hopeless, the road most taxing, we may also find that it is then that the Risen Christ catches up to us on the way...for it is He--not His gifts, not His power, not what He can do for us, but He Himself--who comes and makes Himself known to us. And this is the one pure joy for those who sorrow." (Elisabeth Elliot)

Thankful for He, Himself...

Jen