you are here!!! and by no accident, either!

 

Anyone remember the line from a card commercial, "when you care enough to send the very best?" Huge sigh. I am about three hours away from my family, part of a "big move" that was needed in order for the husband to finally have work. Don't get me wrong...I love this little town, the bucolic and safe idea of being where everyone knows your name and time stops while we all get acquainted. But I wonder why God has placed me here...now...

My second grandson is now one year old...his little party is today. I have another grandchild on the way. My daughter will finally graduate from college after almost five years of hard study...and it breaks my mommy heart that I can't be there to share it all. I cry from the sheer enormity of "how does one cut the cords that tie and bind?"

I think about what the Holy Family went through....their exile into Egypt with all of the uncertainties and fears from the Roman empire gone amok...though we try to make plans...our plans can sometimes go a whole different way! Back when I was in high school, the main idea our counselors tried to instill in us was to have a goal...five years...ten years..where do you want to be in that time? Well...when one is only 16 and can see foreverrrrrrrr.........age vs goals didn't seem so important then. 
Oh sure, some had high aspirations and achieved them. Others, like me, went along for the ride...I had visions of being a veterinarian. Didn't work out...yet I DID work at a boarding kennel for 19 years...so I had the animal experience. During that time I was an animal control officer and finally worked at a vet clinic for a vet that I had known since I was 11 years old, mucking out cages. It wasn't a wasted effort and I learned a lot!

Going back to the Holy Family--how do you think Joseph felt...being told in a dream to "get up, take your wife and child and flee!" To leave what they knew and move to a place where they had no one but each other--that took real courage and a Faith in God that many of us could be--and should be-- inspired by. To always have the Roman government breathing down your back, looking for any reason to castigate you...now that is some real stress! For Mary, the mother of Jesus, to have her worries but could only ponder them within her heart...she is an example to all of us moms who worry about our own families. I think about how, when she was told her child was the Son of God...then to watch in disbelief as He was crucified...I still can't wrap my head around this....your own child...tortured for doing what He knew was true and right and good....!!!

Yet we do this today, do we not? We watch our own kids grow up, go off and do "things." It may not always be what we wanted, it may not be the five year or ten year plan we wish for them...it may be that they become something we wouldn't wish on anyone...but like Mary, we watch from the sidelines....we feel pride when they succeed and pain when they fall. We realize that we will not always be there to kiss their boo-boos anymore...and this is what pains me still. I cannot hug my kids every day, look them in the eye and say..."maybe tomorrow will be a better day!" I have to take on Faith that they will accomplish what they must. I only hope they know that within my heart, I am with them in spirit...and that I pray for them constantly.

Yesterday afternoon, my husband got a wild hair to go pheasant hunting. He'd been talking about it for awhile now...got a permit, took his shotgun and off he went. Ah, a plan, right? I was anticipating a pheasant....I envisioned cooking it...what a feast! Except that he didn't come home with said bird. Instead, his "plans" went awry as he became so enamored with the beauty of the autumn countryside here, he got lost. Hopelessly, "I don't have a clue as to where I am!" LOST! He called me on his cell phone. I wasn't too worried...at first. "Just get on the main highway, find the crossroad that will bring you to me." No problem, although it was now becoming dark. I worried about deer collisions, I worried about his running out of gas...I worried about so much. His calls increased, I could now hear the tinge of worry in his voice as he said, "I am so frustrated, I don't know where I am!" And I also was scared for him, as I am NOT a country girl, I had NO idea where he was, either...and I had NO way to direct him home. I prayed. Then inspiration hit me....after his last call, when I realized that he had taken a wrong turn and was now heading towards Canada if he kept up his journey-- I called his brother, who knows the area very well. I described the landmarks my husband gave to me. "Oh yeah...I know where he is...I'll call him and help him out!" Whew! Load off my mind! and soon, about an hour later...he was home. Safe!...none the worse for wear! (Me? I was a nervous wreck!)

And so we come back full circle to Mary. Can you imagine...being called upon to leave something familiar and going to.....who knows where?  For as long as it took for the political climate to settle down to a dull roar? To have to start over...and over...and when Jesus was crucified...to have to start over yet again? Yet she didn't contemplate ANY of this...when the angel Gabriel announced her impending mission, her response was, "be it done to me according to thy word!" So simple! No real plans...no big aspirations, just child-like Faith that whatever happened, whatever detour, whatever could be....God would be in the details.

This should and must be our attitude also. When the "stuff" of life strikes us...and it always does....be it death, illness, job loss, relocation, a move, a birth, whatever...God is in the details. Repeat...God is in the details!!! 

May you have a blessed day!