Counting down...

Sometimes those final minutes take forever to tick by. That was most of my summer. But occasionally time just hurls you forward like a catapult, painfully abrupt in the take off and the landing. That is my week.

Amidst the busyness of saying good-bye to friends and family, of trying not to go insane as I deal with those men in dark suits with the power to financially sink or swim my plans, of packing away the final pieces of this life that I will be carrying with me, a single line from an old song has been my crutch. When we were young, Mother would always sing, "The joy of the Lord is my strength." We would even sort of musically laugh the whole way through the song, I guess as evidence of the Lord's joy in us :) It was fun to sing when I was little, but it's truth never really popped out to me so much as now. Who knew there was so much to do in preparation for departure? But that line reminds me of two things.

First, my strength is not of myself. I can only get me so far before I falter. But in my weakness, God is glorified. The other day I was thinking about how little I credit God for, a thought that returned when I was talking with Grandma this morning. She has such gratitude to and dependence on Him and affirms it often. I was humbled to realize how little glory I give to God, when He acts so powerfully in my life. But He doesn't stop because of my blindness, or Debbie and Crystal definitely wouldn't have shown up at exactly the right time to save the day :) (Thank you both so much! I can't even tell you how much it meant to me just to be able to let everything out right then.) It's not that He's not acting. It's that I'm not looking.

Second, "the joy of the Lord." Dratted joyfulness. But worse still is crankiness! Honestly, if I rely simply on my physical state of being as the barometer for my mood, the rest of my week is going to just tank. I don't foresee much sleep between now and 6:30AM on Sunday morning. But joy is not dependent on physical circumstances. Otherwise, Paul could never have written his letter to the Philippians, or, at the very least, it would have been greatly modified.

Anyway, if I didn't/don't get to say good-bye to any of you, I really am sorry! I love you all and will miss you. But hey, with so many avenues of technology, you have no excuse not to stay in touch! So email me, call me, write to me. I'm on Facebook, and there are about 17 different ways to talk to someone on Facebook. And of course, I will be updating this blog throughout the year (no promises about the frequency), so you can always leave comments here. :)