4 WriteStuff

Some time in the past week, I made the crossover to winter… I really hadn’t noticed until the pellet stove turned on.

When fall arrives, I’m constantly looking at the thermometer… “it’s cold in here, why hasn’t the pellet stove turned on (it’s set for 55)?” The thermometer said it was 70. This morning I was up at 4:30, walked out and saw the pellet stove was on – “Why is the stove on, did I forget to turn the thermostat down?” It’s 55 in the front room (60 in my office), I’m quite comfortable in my sweatshirt and warm socks. I’ve adjusted to the winter temps.

Yesterday as I bustled around outside in my sweatshirt, I thought, “what a beautiful day!” The shade, where the frost still hadn’t melted, was a bit chilly, but it’s not like I was having a picnic there, I was enjoying the sunshine.

We do the same spiritually. It’s easy to skip one meeting (prayer time with God, church, Bible study, etc)… then we skip another and another. It’s not that we can’t go on vacation, etc, but that “I’m tired” gets to be a way of life rather than an event if I’m not careful. Had that conversation with someone yesterday. When I don’t exercise, I quickly get too tired to exercise. When I’m in busy mode, there’s never enough time. Pretty soon I’m in always in tired mode or “too busy” mode… such a dangerous place to be!! Busy/tired mode is where I’m operating under my own steam instead of God’s. Busy or tired mode is the cold zone, I need that fire to be effective rather than just barely functioning, I need peace or there will never been enough time to do accomplish much of significance… Sometimes I’m so focused on trying to function that I don’t even notice what missing, until the thermometer tells me my temperature is too low, or the clock tells me I have been moving way too slow.

I often laugh at an event that occurred when we were building our home, we were living in a travel trailer and I was homeschooling all 3 kids while we built. Some days were flat out chaotic. One morning I had cement trucks coming at 5:30 a.m.. I hit the ground running, without my morning God time. About halfway through the afternoon, I was having a conversation with Tiffany, apparently I was (quite) a bit snippy, she said, “Wow! I can tell who didn’t get their prayer time this morning!” That was a shocking wake up… my thermometer was WAY off! At this point I could snap back or pay attention. It has been grilled into me that I need to constantly check the gauges on my car to make sure that it doesn’t overheat. Ignoring them doesn’t make the problem go away. Likewise in my home, if I don’t pay attention, I can have frozen pipes and that’s a HUGE fix! That was a huge call to “excuse me for a few minutes… I need some, ‘adjust my attitude/God time.'”

I’m up early, I have a huge list of things to do today, but I don’t see anything more important on my list than plugging into my power source… Right now I look outside and I see an amazing tapestry of stars – Orion – “the mighty one,” born of a virgin, who came to crush the serpent… soon there will be another amazing sunrise… night and day, God has placed lights in the heavens to remind us of His presence, to call us to come and enjoy His amazing masterpiece with Him. Oh, my heart, spending time in His presence… Nothing like a cup of hot tea with Jesus in the morning to warm the day… I am awed.