Visiting a Cemetery

A friend of mine from MI, who studies genealogy as a hobby, found that some relatives of hers are buried in a cemetery here in PA and asked if I would go and take pictures of the gravestones for her. My first thoughts were that it was kind of a weird request, sounds creepy just to go wandering around a cemetery, and how hard it would be to actually find the grave stones! But today beng the day after Memorial Day seemed like the best day of any to give it a try and it turned out to be a great experience. The park was decorated more than I presume is usual because they held a Memorial Day service, plenty of flags and fresh flowers brightened up the nicely kept green lawn. A lady in the office and a gardener helped us find the plots and we did some crayon rubbings of a couple beautiful features on some of the gravestones. My daughter asked if my friend's relatives were sleeping there, and of course this prompted a good discussion about death- how we all will die, only God knows how long we have to live, and that God wants us to love Him and love others as much as possible before that happens. This visit inspired my reading for some meditation time today, I bet you can guess in what book- Ecclesiastes! Here are my chapter titles and some of the main verses that stuck out to me:

The Word:
The Vanity of Life, The Grief of Wisdom, The Vanity of Pleasure, The End of the Wise and the Fool, Everything Has It's Time, Injustice Seems to Prevail, The Vanity of Selfish Toil, The Value of a Friend, Popularity Passes Away, Fear God, Keep Your Vows, The Canity of Gain and Honor, The Value of Practical Wisdom, Obey Authorities for God's Sake, Death Comes to All, Wisdom Superior to Folly, The Value of Diligence, Seek God Early in Life....."Go and eat your bread with joy, And drink your wine with a merry heartl For God has already accepted your works." Ch. 9:7 "Live joyfully with the wife whom you love all the days of your vain life which He has given you under the sun...Whatever your hand finds to do, do it wtih your might" 9: 9-10

Even just these titles help my persepctive shift to where it should be- on the eternal, while valuing each day as a gift and joy to live in the knowledge and love of our Savior.

Prayer:
When I feel like grumbling about temper tantrums, spills, dirt, miscommunication, God please help me to remember that life is really too short not to love!

Food Story: I really felt the pull of temptation again already today to just stop and get an amazing McDonald's diet coke, or eat the chips and cookie left over from yesterday's bbq. Again I know it's not about denying myself for my own righteousness, but seriously life is too short to care SO much about eating unhealthy (albeit delicious) foods, I am more excited to spend so much time listening for an praying on the things of God, as if this were my last day living :)

Back on for Tuesdays

I am currently reading "The Cost of Discipleship" by Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and wouldn't you know that some things about fasting stuck out to me: customs such as fastng "have only one purpose- to make disciples more ready and cheerful to accomplish those things which God would have done. Fasting helps to discipline the self-indulgent and slothful will which is so reluctant to serve the Lord...When the flesh is satisfied it is hard to pray with cheerfulness or to devote one-self to a life of service which calls for much self-renunciation." Fasrinf has not helped me feel more self-righteous, but rather more aware of my self-indulgent nature and the need to eradicate it- on at least a weekly basis. I would love to say that switching to a more spontaneous fast when needs arose, but I found too many excuses and probably passed up many opportunities to draw nearer to God's heart in praying for needs of others.

I understand some might see this as heaping up duties or rules on myself, but really I have just been missing that closeness, hungering, and other-centered focus I felt during the months of regular prayer and fasting. And writing in this blog was also a great way to make sure I was actually listening and taking time to think about what God was revealing to me, and be able to go back and be reminded regularly of these things.

I am expecting God will make Himself known to me even more deeply when I seek Him with all my heart. I am looking forward to next Tuesday!

A long time

So as evidenced by the posting dates, it has been a while since I fasted. Last week was the first time I actually thought about something and someone to pray and fast for. I did not eat lunch that day, but I spent very little time listening or praying and did not take the time to process the day by blogging about it, which I saw after stopping really helped me internalize what I heard from the Spirit. I knew inadvance that this week a family member was going to have an extremely difficult day and planned to pray and fast for her to feel the comfort and presence of the Lord. When the day rolled around, I am ashamed to say that I made up a bunch of excuses not to follow through with it, the strongest one being I just didn't feel like it. At the end of the day I remembered part of our Sunday's sermon ringing in my head, about how Moses could have missed an amazing experience with God when he saw the burning bush... ("Oh, that's interesting, I will see if it's still burning when i walk back by here next") It wasn't so much that I felt guilty about not praying and fasting, because that's not what it's about, but I do think that I missed an encounter with God, and an opportunity to draw closer to family. So I am writing now to recommitt myself and turn from apathy and other excuses. It is crazy how quickly I can slip back into caring more about myself than sacrificing for someone else, or just going about with my day without thinking of others. I know God will bring an opportunity soon, be back any day now!