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I Am Blessed
This has been a most unusual year, as I doubt any of you would argue. And not a very good one in many ways. But have you also been blessed? I certainly have been, and quite spectacularly, too. I’d like to share some of my blessings with you and urge you to consider your own. Maybe you will share them with us; I, for one, would love to hear them.
I’ve lost 51 pounds since May. This is nearly inconceivable to me. I’m so grateful for friends who have helped and supported me through this process – you know who you are! I’ll be forever in your debt.
The weight loss has enabled an increase in my activity level and many of you know Rick and I purchased electric bikes a few months ago. I’m on the move again and love it!
I started this blog in August after a rather startling prayer event during which I was impressed to do so. I didn’t know the first thing about putting a blog together, though I’d wanted one for some time. I hit Google up for information and in less than 24 hours from the thought that said “Go!”, had it up and running. If no one else was blessed, I could still say that I have been, enormously. And some of you have also been, or so you’ve told me. Words can’t express my appreciation for your taking the time to read these posts and for your comments. God bless you! I managed to snag a free-lance writing job for which we’re still negotiating the particulars. That promises to afford me much pleasure.
I needed some major dental work done (emphasis on the “major”) and decided to move forward with it in September. It has been a not altogether pleasant experience but I’m very excited about the results to this point. I’m 4/7 of the way done – eight teeth down, six to go. By the end of January I’ll have a new smile!
My father is still living at just shy of 93. He’s led a remarkable life, and my sister has enabled the last several years of it. For her, I’m grateful in the extreme. Thank you so much, Susie. This is not an easy time in the life of a family but there have been some bright spots, too.
Rick and I celebrated 48 years of marriage in August. God alone knows how thankful I am to have been partnered with this man for these many eventful years. We plan to spend eternity together and that makes us both smile in gratitude.
And that brings me to what I’m the most thankful for of all: Jesus and the future He makes possible for us, an eternal future. Jeremiah, in one of Scripture’s better-known verses, says, ” ‘For I know the plans I have for you,’ declares the Lord, ‘plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.’ ” (Jeremiah 29:11, NIV). Hope for the present, however difficult we might find these times to be, and the assurance that these tough times won’t last. There’s much better coming, friends. Much!
So take heart. Count your blessings over this past year (and share them with us, please, either here at the site or on FB, where I’ll be sure this gets posted). Consider that as dismal or exciting as this year has been for you, this is only a short stage we’re passing through. Our true lives, the lives we were meant for, haven’t even started yet.
I am blessed. And so are you.
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Finding Gobi
At the start of Day Two, Dion looked down at a flicker of movement by his feet. There sat a small, fuzzy brown dog looking up at him expectantly. Dion had no idea who she was or where she’d come from.
Dion is an ultra marathoner, and in March of 2016 he was in the Gobi Desert in China to compete in the 155-mile, 6-day, 7-stage Four Deserts Gobi race. He and the dog were in the middle of nowhere.
Dion would have thought little of it except that the dog took off when he did and kept pace with him the entire day; she never left his side. That night in camp, when she looked at him imploringly, he shared with her a little of his precious store of water and some special high-calorie food. On Day Three their lives changed forever.
Coming to a wide, strong-running river, Dion plunged in and across. This accomplished, he looked around for the little dog. She was nowhere to be seen. Turning back from whence he’d come, he spotted her on the far shore; she would be unable to cross on her own. And then what would become of her? She had her eyes fixed on him.
Dion had a decision to make. Should he continue on, leaving the dog to a quite likely unfortunate fate, or go back – almost certainly foregoing his chance at a win, and at the very least prolonging the event that would already call out of him all he had to give?
He didn’t hesitate for long. He threw himself back into the water, returned for the tiny bundle, then crossed back over for the third time, pup in arms. He said, in a recent interview with a Louisiana TV station, “It’s a heart-warming and inspiring story that came from one act of kindness – namely, helping Gobi across the river because she couldn’t get across on her own. That one act truly altered both of our lives, and I wouldn’t change a thing.” Dion named Gobi at that time and became her protector, benefactor, and provider. He promised her he’d take her home to Scotland with him.
Gobi ran next to Dion for 77 of the 155 miles.
When it was not safe for her to run – for example, when temperatures got up to 125 degrees Fahrenheit (Ummmm … Is it safe for humans to be running in that temperature?!) – Dion put her in a chase vehicle. And they crossed the finish line together. Someone placed medals around each of their necks. Both are smiling widely.
This was only the start of the story, however. Race over, Dion left Gobi in the care of race organizers in a Chinese city of 3,000,000 people. He returned to Scotland to make application and arrangements for Gobi to leave China and enter Scotland.
There Gobi was allowed to escape. Now she was loose and on her own in a city not known for its concern for animals. But Dion went to work. He returned immediately to China to find her. A promise is a promise, after all. In an amazing effort involving posters, flyers, phone calls, TV and radio stations, long car rides, door-to-door visits, and the mobilization of a small group of volunteers, Gobi was finally located and she and Dion reunited. She had a large gash on her head and was limping badly.
In time, after hip surgery and a four-month quarantine period, Gobi finally arrived in Scotland where she lives today with Dion, his wife, and a cat who has her own astounding story (and book!). That is, she’s there between frequent trips all over the world for appearances to various groups and fund-raising efforts for animal causes.
And it all started with one act of compassion shown by one of God’s creatures for another. We can all be compassionate, caring, other-centered. And should be. God asks this of us. About the animals He said, “For every beast of the forest is Mine, the cattle on a thousand hills. I know every bird of the mountains, and everything that moves in the field is Mine” (Psalm 50:10, 11). Because He cares, we should care; we should do what we can.
And check out Finding Gobi: A Little Dog With a Very Big Heart by Dion Leonard. You won’t be sorry and that’s a promise!
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An Octopus Like Otto
I’m on an octopus kick at the present time. If these aren’t one of our planet’s more amazing creatures – my, oh, my!
There are around 300 recognized species of octopuses. A book I’ve read recently, entitled The Soul of an Octopus by Sy Montgomery, dealt mostly with Giant Pacific octopuses she knew. And who knew her!
Yes, these invertebrates, to whom we might credit little to no real intelligence, are actually extremely highly intelligent. Octopuses in captivity recognize individual humans; they love to interact with the ones they like – caressing and kissing them, being stroked and spoken to by them – and torment the ones they don’t. They play games, enthusiastically explore and try and test new environments, solve puzzles, open things, and escape whenever possible. The latter is generally to their great detriment, as they cannot be out of the water for long. Unless the escape is observed and the octopus saved from its determined objective, it will almost certainly die.
The females are called by some the “hardest-working moms on the planet.” Depending on the species, one female can give birth to as many as 200,000 eggs, and then must tend to them until they hatch. That generally takes in the neighborhood of five to ten months. The mothers-to-be do not eat in all that time. They gently sweep, protect, and clean their eggs, never leaving them for a moment. This takes place in a den where she’s strung up all the tiny eggs in many multiples of strings. They look a little like huge clusters of minuscule grapes.
Octopuses have a muscular tube called a funnel, or siphon, through which they can squirt water. And they have a sense of humor.
Six-month-old Otto (pictured when older) played a trick on the staff at the Sea Star Aquarium in Coburg, Germany a few years ago. According to Elfriede Kummer, the aquarium’s director, for two days running staff came to work to find the entire electrical system shorted out. They fixed it each time. On the third morning when staff arrived and turned on the lights, they found Otto in the very act of knocking it out again by squirting out the 2000-watt spotlight over his tank. It turns out that Otto had been trained to squirt at visitors because it delighted them. He apparently recognized that he caused a commotion and gained attention by doing this. There was really a commotion, he discovered, when he shot the lights out, so he kept doing it.
Given a chessboard to distract him, Otto played regularly with it for some time before tiring of it and tossing it out of his tank. Then it was on to something else.
These precious creatures are in our charge. In Genesis 1:21, God tells Adam and Eve that they are to “Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground” (NIV).
These are sentient beings. They know things, can learn things, are able to teach us things. Job said, “But ask the animals, and they will teach you, or the birds of the air, and they will tell you; or speak to the earth, and it will teach you, or let the fish of the sea inform you. Which of all these does not know that the hand of the Lord has done this? In His hand is the life of every creature and the breath of all mankind” (Job 12:7-10, NIV).
Creatures other than ourselves (but creatures like ourselves also) are entrusted to us to care for, not given over so that we might hurt them. What an awesome privilege and honor this is! What pleasure they bring us and what pleasure we might give them.
One day I hope to be kissed by an octopus. An octopus like Otto.
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Sonder
I’ve always loved to watch people; I’ve been an observer since I was small. As a fairly serious introvert, I often prefer to sit or stand back than to interact. I’ve enjoyed wondering, though, through the years, about peoples’ lives, their families, their jobs, what they think, how they feel, why they’re where they are, where they’re going. Malls, libraries, sporting events, airports, churches, and restaurants are ideal places to people-watch.
But this is what I know about all of them: I know they are each individuals with interesting, fulfilling, troubled, complicated, joyous, painful and, in short, fascinating lives, not unlike my own. I know their lives are as full and varied as mine is. I know they suffer and rejoice and work things out – with loved ones, on the job, in their friend circles – like I do. They are as invested in their lives and the lives of those they love as I am. If I knew them I’d like (most of) them.
Until recently I didn’t know there is a word for this. And until recently, there wasn’t.
A man named John Koenig has an online compendium he calls The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows; it consists of words he’s invented in an effort to fill a hole in the language, to give a name to emotions we feel but don’t have a word for. These are neologisms – “. . . beautiful new words that we need but do not yet have,” according to novelist John Green.
Now there is “sonder.”
And here is sonder’s definition: “n. the realization that each random passerby is living a life as vivid and complex as your own – populated with their own ambitions, friends, routines, worries and inherited craziness – an epic story that continues invisibly around you like an anthill sprawling deep underground, with elaborate passageways to thousands of other lives you’ll never know existed, in which you might appear only once, as an extra sipping coffee in the background, as a blur of traffic passing on the highway, as a lighted window at dusk.”
Isn’t that lovely? We are connected, in intricate and unseen ways to so many more individuals than those with whom we’re actually acquainted. We could be acquainted with them; we just aren’t.
Our influence, though, can impact some of these unknowns, maybe many of them. To smile at a stranger hurrying by, to open the door for one, to simply say hello to another, can change their lives and, because each one knows so many others, change many others’ lives also.
I’m reminded of the saying, attributed to the young adult author Wendy Mass, that we should “Be kind, for everyone you meet (or see!) is fighting a battle you know nothing about” (parentheses mine).
We are strangers to most people; most people are strangers to us. But we are connected because we are all human, we are all children of God. As we would hope to be treated, so should we treat others.
Look for ways to connect. We’re more alike than we might think, though of course specific individual circumstances vary. Give folks the benefit of the doubt whenever you can. Be careful, certainly. But ponder sonder . . .
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Give Thanks
It’s a couple of days past the American Thanksgiving holiday as I write this. My husband and I spent most of the day quietly at home, but we did visit briefly, at a distance, with two close friends in the afternoon. We came to the end of the day feeling enormously blessed.
And we’re blessed despite our troubles. I hope you feel yourselves to be blessed despite yours. Paul said, in 1 Thessalonians 5:18, that we are to “give thanks in all circumstances” (NIV) and he meant it. It’s not a suggestion; it’s a directive. For despite our problems, we have much to be grateful for. Because of our problems, we have much to be grateful for. Problems can be, in God’s hands, among our greatest blessings, as many have discovered.
Though God is present and active at all times, I believe He can do the most in us and with us and for us when times are the toughest. That’s when we’re most apt to recognize our need of Him and to seek Him out.
So . . . now, when we’re sick, as some of you are or have been; when whole countries are in disarray and under threat; when friends and family members find themselves on opposite sides of what seems to be a vast, uncrossable divide; when some of us are questioning the strength of our faith and whether or not our relationship with Jesus is what we thought it was – now is it asked of us to be thankful?
In a word, yes.
It’s easy, or at least easier, to trust God in the good times, or so it seems to me. I have no difficulty being grateful for what are clearly, noticeably, blessings – things like comfortable shelter, reliable transportation, good health, love in the home, a gorgeous sunset, tasty food, books, mountains and green trees, parents and sister, educational opportunities, a sweet kitty, church and church family, and much more.
But throw a threatening world-wide illness in, add some significant social unrest, and top all that off with extremely unfortunate political ills (from whichever side you’re looking), and – wow! things change.
Still, our injunction is to give thanks in all circumstances. How can we reasonably be expected to do that? Is it even possible? It is, and it involves faith. As we look at how God has led us in the past, familiarize ourselves with His promises for the present and the future, and trust Him, we can be assured that all will turn out well for those who are His. All things do work together for good (Romans 8:28) as we’ve always been told. We have not a thing to fear, whatever our situations look like, feel like, are. All will eventually be remedied. We will understand then what we don’t understand now about our tough times.
In the meantime, it is ours to keep moving, ours to believe, ours to enjoy God’s blessings to us whatever form they may take, ours to express our gratitude.
What are you thankful for?
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Influences
I woke up a couple of mornings ago to a “Memory” on Facebook. I’d posted two pictures (the two you see here) and related how the two buildings shown, and what went on inside them, had had such an impact on my life. They are of a church and a library, as you can see. My church. My library. The church and library of my youngest self.
My parents (sometimes) and grandparents (most of the time) took my sister and me to the church. Constructed of tan brick and complete with a three-story entry-way that suggested a battlement on a castle to me, I found the place inviting and delightful. I loved to go there. The kids met in the basement for programs geared to children before the actual formal church service began. After that, we met with whichever adults accompanied us for the main service. I preferred to sit in the large balcony, but was rarely able to until I got older and was allowed to join my friends there without my adults.
It was there, in that church, that I met Jesus and saw Him in people around me, and most particularly in my grandparents. It put me on a distinct and definite course, one I shamefully deviated from for a time but, happily, returned to.
It was my mother who took us to the library. I recognized it immediately as my heart’s home. Dedicated in 1905, it was (and still is, though no longer a library) a gorgeous building. It was made of a maroon-colored pressed brick from Kansas and gray sandstone from Tenino, Washington. I loved it then and I love to look at it still.
I suppose I was five, maybe six, on my first step through the heavy wooden front door. And I could never get back often enough. I learned to read early and I read a lot. Of course all my reading (anything and everything), along with the church involvement I’ve already mentioned – and school, it must be said – formed me into the older child, then adolescent, young woman, and eventual old-ager I’ve become. I owe a great debt to all who made those buildings available to me (the good, forward-looking citizens of that community, the architects, and the builders) and those who enabled me in my learning (parents, grandparents, pastors, teachers, librarians, and other interested, invested adults around me), many of whom I never met.
I’m reminded of this assertion by Solomon: “Train a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not turn from it” (and the same goes for “she” children – Proverbs 22:6, NIV). I can see this is true. Having been exposed at an early age to two institutions set up to provide learning, guidance, perspective, opportunity, a broad range of experiences and tales of others’ experiences, and direction, I’ve developed into who I am. The same is true for you as regards what you were exposed to early on.
Without the influences of our earliest childhoods, we’d be completely different people from who we are. I wouldn’t be me and you wouldn’t be you. And for my part, I can confidently say that I’ve changed little in my outlook and perspective over the years between then and now. I’ve stayed pretty much on the course set when I entered these two buildings for the first time and encountered religion and reading. I wouldn’t have it any other way.
Are there buildings in your past that have impacted the trajectory of your life? Share with us. Include pictures if you have them.
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Playlist
I’ve rarely been so moved as I was recently watching a clip of Marta Cinta Gonzalez, a Spanish ballerina beset by Alzheimer’s and advanced old age, reacting to a recording of Swan Lake from her wheelchair. Slumped and silent, she comes absolutely alive as the first chords sound. She sits up straight and her hands begin to carve graceful patterns in the air. Then her arms rise and she flutters, as if in flight.
She swoops, she bends, she bows as if settling to the floor, which is exactly what she’s doing. As she moves, a film is interspersed with the footage of a young woman performing a similar ballet (The Dying Swan). It was initially reported that the young ballerina was Marta herself in her heyday, but apparently is not. No matter. It’s clear that Marta has performed these movements we’re looking at many times to the music she’s hearing and they perfectly mirror the ones made by the woman in the video.
It’s about as touching a sight as you’ll ever see. And out of my sharing this on Facebook came suggestions from friends of other, related informational clips on the impact of music, especially on those with dementia and Parkinson’s, present most frequently in the elderly.
One particular film I couldn’t recommend more highly (thank you, Trudie) can be found on YouTube and is called “Power Of Music On The Brain/Dementia & Parkinson’s.” The footage is astounding and the impact demonstrated very nearly unbelievable. Several people with advanced dementia, some of them nonverbal, all of them highly impaired, react immediately and vigorously when earphones attached to an iPod are placed over their ears. The iPods have been loaded with their favorite music, selected by loved ones who know them. The response is instantaneous. They variously begin to sing, whistle, clap, speak, make faces, smile, laugh, tap. Staff and loved ones beam and cry. Some are able to converse for awhile afterwards, amazingly coherently. For a few moments, lucidity returns.
A couple of severely-affected Parkinson’s victims are also featured. They can be lurching, shuffling, and/or teetering one second and, as soon as the music commences, dancing the next.
I’d been aware before this recent experience of some of the impacts music can have on us, but was taken way beyond them by this film. Music’s effect is to awaken us, speak to us, move us. And to watch these people react to a soundtrack made just for them made me think of what I’d want on my own. Made me, in fact, think of actually putting a playlist together. I know, without any effort at all, some of what I’d want on it. Some favorite hymns. A few songs from my childhood and young adulthood. The National Anthem. Jacqueline DuPre on the cello. Glenn Gould performing Bach. A complete list will require some thought. But I’m serious about this; I’d love to have it whether I need it for the purpose described in the film or not (I pray not).
What would be on yours? Seriously, what would be on yours? Share here or on Facebook, where I’ll be sure this is posted. I’m eager to hear.
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Grace
I’m about half-way through a major dental reconstruction project and I can tell you it’s been brutal. I’ll be pleased in the extreme when the job is done.
Earlier this week I spent another four-plus hours in the chair. Three hours in I’d had the four craters formed by the removal of four crowns and parts of four teeth “packed with cord.” That’s the term the very young, very new assistant used. It wasn’t awful, what with the numerous injections for numbing I’d insisted upon, but it was surely unpleasant. And time-consuming. She’d made the impressions for the four temporary crowns and, apparently, removed the cords. Thus far, I’d been able to keep up and even to exhibit some grace in the process. I smiled and chatted whenever there were no hands and/or instruments in my mouth.
But now I was told the impressions hadn’t taken and would need to be repeated. Gulp. OK. And right after that I heard the assistant say, “I’ll repack the cords now.”
Grace fled.
“Repack the cords?” I asked incredulously, and maybe a little loudly, and sat up. I could see I’d startled the young woman. I was a little startled myself.
“Well, . . . yes,” she said uncertainly. “It all needs to be redone.”
I sat back. Oh, mercy! Grace was distant but it was grace that was needed at this moment. Time to pray. “Lord, give me patience. Help me to be gracious. I know these things happen. Just please enable this process and bring me out the other side. Soon. Be with (name of the assistant). Thank You. Amen.”
And while I lay there being “repacked,” I thought of instances when grace had been extended to me by others and for which I was grateful every time. One stands out.
I was driving on a busy freeway in a large city, somewhat lost in thought. I saw my exit coming up and realized I needed to be in the lane to my right. Over I went without taking proper care. As I belatedly looked, I could see a wide-eyed woman right next to me. She was gripping the wheel hard and trying to maintain her position, cars ahead of her and cars behind her. She had nowhere to go and I was just inches away.
I swerved back, clapped my hand over my mouth in horror, and caught her eye. Apologizing as best I could with gestures and mouthed words, I quaked with the knowledge that I might easily have badly injured her, or worse. She would have been similarly aware. But she waved and smiled at me.
That’s grace. I didn’t deserve that response but am extremely grateful that it’s the response I got. And now, in the dental chair, I was being given the opportunity to extend grace myself, to wave and smile. I collected myself and did just that.
“Thank you,” I said when she was done, and grinned. “Good job.”
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Not Willing to Separate
The ad read, “Two adult sister cats in need of a good home. Willing to separate.”
Willing to separate? Two fully grown sister cats? No, no!
My husband and I were looking for two cats and had already met a brother/sister pair named Rico and Luna that we were inclined to bring home with us. But I was still looking at notices. It was the “willing to separate” that caught my eye.
“Rick, look! Here are sisters who’ve never been apart and the owner is willing to split them up. We’ve got to go look at them!” And so we did.
We were goners as soon as our gazes fell upon beautiful long-black-furred Min and a very portly and very lovely tawny tabby named Ping. Soon they were each in a carrier in our backseat crying and carrying on at their sudden change in circumstances. That didn’t last long. Four days later they’d settled enough to show themselves, make tentative approaches to us, and look generally like they were going to get by all right in our home. They eventually grew to love us, and we most certainly loved them.
Willing to separate – what ominous-sounding words! No one wants to be separated from a loved one. Even cats.
And God does not wish to be separated from us, as evidenced by the price He paid to make it possible for us to be together. The prospect of living without us, His beloved, forever, caused Him to take the most dramatic action possible – He gave His very own life to ensure us the opportunity to choose it; that is, life with Him. A relationship with us – each of us individually – is what He wants more than anything else. We’re His family. “How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are!” (1 John 3:1, NIV).
The best-known verse in all of scripture tells us why He wants this relationship with us: “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life” (John 3:16, NKJV). In short, He loves us, supremely and absolutely, and He wishes to have us with Him. He craves our company. He wants to be with us! This is almost beyond our ability to comprehend. We don’t even like each others’ company much of the time. But this is not true of God, fortunately for us all. We’re each the apple of His eye (Deuteronomy 32:10, Psalm 17:8, Proverbs 7:2, Zechariah 2:8), and provision has been made for all of us to be saved.
No, God did not bow to the prospect of being separated from us when sin intruded and it might have appeared that that was the inevitable outcome. Instead, He took measures to stay in touch with us, hold us together, and save us to live again, with Him.
Min and Ping could easily have been separated. They were not. Neither need we be separated from God nor He from us. It’s our choice.
“Children, come to Me,” He pleads. “I love you. I’ve made it possible for us to spend eternity together. It’s what I most want. Please come. I am not willing to separate.”
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Cozy
In the book Cozy: The Art of Arranging Yourself in the World, author Isabel Gillies discusses the concept of “cozy”: What does the word mean to her? What might it mean to others? What does it mean to you?
We lit our first fire of the season this morning; it’s gotten downright chilly here. And I’ve yet to discover anything quite like a fire, hot beverage, warm pajamas, good book, a cat or two, and nowhere to go and nothing that must be done for the next little while. That spells cozy to me.
What spells cozy to you? If we’re at all alike, cozy suggests comfort, safety, warmth, security, shelter, refuge, assurance, certainty, and more to you. It suggest all those things and more to Ms. Gillies as well, and she offers up much food for thought. Her book is a fascinating read.
Does Scripture have anything to say about cozy? I believe it does. How about this? “Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God, and the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:6, 7; NIV). What’s that? Don’t be anxious about anything? Present your requests – to the very God of the universe – with thanksgiving? And, it’s implied, you may have the assurance that He hears and answers? The transcending (!) peace of God is available to us? Wow! That sounds like comfort, safety, warmth, security, shelter, refuge, assurance, certainty, and more to me. With that kind of confidence in Who’s got hold of us, we can relax back into His arms with a great sigh of relief and a great deal of appreciation and gratitude. That’s cozy.
David, before he became the sitting king of Israel, wrote much of the Psalms on the run; it’s full of his claims of God’s faithfulness to him, God’s interest in and availability to him, the many deliverances from harm God empowered, and so. Here’s just one: “The Lord is my rock, my fortress and my deliverer; my God is my rock, in whom I take refuge, my shield and the horn of my salvation. He is my stronghold, my refuge and my savior – . . .” (Psalm 22:2, 3; NIV). That same God is available to us. That same strong arm holds and helps us. Those same ears hear our pleas and respond. That’s amazing and certainly should put us at our ease; should enable us to take a long, deep breath, relax, and let go/let Him. He’s got a good, firm, loving grip on us.
That’s ultimate cozy, my friends.