Peeking

I really thought I would be overjoyed that the boys are gone every day to school.

I am happy and relieved when they pull themselves together and get out the door, it is a great change. But surprisingly to me, I am a bit like the cat...I am missing them.

(Though...not quite as desperately.)

I have learned since God moved into my life, to be more aware of His speaking to me through His creation. I believed for a long time that this was a delightful gift just for me - I thought it was just the sweetest thing. He still is at it, daily, but there is something more.

I took a while in our relationship for me to realize that God doesn't like stasis. Nope, He doesn't.
He is onto something new everyday. As much as I am able, He will grow me quickly (a literal form of miracle grow), a real bending/stretching/pulling kind of growing. I am not sure I like this part.

And lately, in this miracle growth, things seem to be peeking out at me where ever I go...

The earth reveals God's splendor and glory, at times in huge and beautiful displays, and times it takes peering in, push leaves aside, hunting a bit. Lately I feel like He is doing this to me. This amazingly Huge God is so invested in such small things? He cares about me?!

Is he checking to see if I am ripe?
If I am changing my leaf color?
If I have new shoots?
If I am crumpled up and dying inside?


And as change inevitably comes, it is okay to not be/do/feel the same. Growth just changes us.

We don't go back to what was.
I sometimes miss parts of me that I liked, or thought I liked. You, too?

It's in the small deaths and valleys of new life that we live...like turning pages as they are written. We like to flip back through, like a glossy magazine we can't seem to throw away, but we can't live it again.

God gave us the most beautiful book with no words to see how this plays out...watching things sprout, bloom, grow and *be amazing* and then wither and fall apart. Some may see it as allegory of one life, I see it as life through -- many little lives and many little deaths.

Some posts I have read this week are so good in dealing with changing, learning, growing. My sweet Molly, whom I adore as a nun+sister here, and my sweet sister in Christ, Flic, sharing her heart here.

I think that these women's expression (click on the pink and play the "lovebomb" video) is so girl+time beautiful...her blog is so good, too. It has made me think about the women in my life and how much I value those relationships. So sweet and real. I also LOVE the freedom of self-expression they display, I am hungry for that.

((It also helped me remember a time when I wrote HIS on the tops of my hands - a tangible outpouring of God's love into me in a very physical way. I should write about that *death/life* someday.))

Prayers for your changes, growth, deaths and passing into new life,
jj