Life just sucks sometimes, and that's the truth! I live and work around so much pain. At my work place, there are so many hurting people. People who have lost loved ones. People who are in abusive relationships. People who are addicted to...whatever! People who hate people because of what another person had done to them. Then, I work with Jr. High and High School students once or twice a week. And their stories are intense: families where domestic violence is a daily reality, girls dating boys who are under house arrest, kids sleeping around at the age of 14, kids whose parents are kicking them out of the house, kids whose families can't afford an extra $10 for the movies.
In all this suckiness, though, life is beautiful. In the last "Thoughts at Random," I spoke of the confusing realities of life regarding insecurities, relationships, and dreams; in this "Thoughts at Random II," I want to talk about the beauty of life. The things we take for granted, but that make all the junk disappear for awhile when we actually SEE them with the eyes of wonder. So, blank out the ugliness with me for a moment. Forget about all of the burdens, and let's journey to picture the small wonders of life. (Note: actually PICTURE them in your mind, allow God to show them t o you a-new).LIGHTENING:
Fireworks from heaven. Each bolt is unique, each boom a little different. The flash lights up the sky, sometimes green, sometimes purple, sometimes yellow, and sometimes white. And the power is so strong, you can feel it! Not only does the thunder from lightening reverberate so loud and long that you feel your heart rumble too at times, but there's a presence in the air. There's a static excitement, as it any minute your hair might start dancing on invisible currents. It's a show for all the senses. A display of creative and powerful genius. The voice of God is like this boom of thunder, behind you, backing you, defending you...His hand like the strike of lightening to any that come against His child. And He shows you this reality through His very own fireworks show in the sky.
A SMILE:
We could have been formed like a nutcracker. Like the wooden doll, our mouth could solely preform the function of "up-down-up-down" just to eat. But instead, our mouth can go sideways. Not just sideways, but downwards, upwards, outwards. Our mouth/lips have the power to communicate how we're feeling without even uttering a word. Oh, and did I mention that our mouth can pucker? How weird would it be if we were formed like that nutcracker and tried to kiss all flat-lipped. Not nearly as pleasant, I imagine. Anyways, derailing! Back to the smile. What an amazing thing a smile is! It has the power to effect change. When you see a stranger sitting alone, and you give them a genuine smile, their countenance changes. It's contagious and they smile back. When you feel down, and you choose to smile, suddenly life becomes hopeful again. And all it is is a sideways, upwards motion of the lips and cheeks. A smile can change a day, make life better, and can even save a life.
GREEN, GREEN GRASS:
There's something about an open field of green grass, or a meadow filled with wild-flowers and greenery that sparks the insides. It makes you want to run, to jump, and to create. It makes you want to play again. It matters not your age. When there's on open field before you, you suddenly desire to leap and skip across it, to lay in it, to take it all inside of you and somehow absorb the vitality that emanates from the greenery. Green, green grass reminds you to LIVE again. It reminds you that no matter how much you trample it, or rip it up, it will grow. It asks you to not only take time to play in life, but also take time to lay down and breathe in the fresh scent of the oxygen the grass produces beneath you. Next time you're in a meadow or field of green, green grass, pause and listen to it. Not to get all "earthy" or "mother-nature," but what I mean is that it communicates the regenerative life of God. God created greenery to take in the bad (CO2) and filter it, allowing good to produce from it (O2). That's how we are to live our lives FULL and VIBRANT. The bad life flings at us, we are to allow to be filtered, so that good will be what comes forth from it - a good that brings life to others.
BIRDS (not the horrible pigeons in Hawaii):
Think about it, they make music! Animals who sing songs! How awesome is that? I take for granted the beautiful notes of the songbird that sings about the day, the sky, and the sun in the morning. I usually don't LISTEN to the way the bird combines different notes to create an actual harmony. The songbird doesn't just have one noise it makes, but is able to combined several different sounds for a distinct song of their own. There's a scripture verse in Psalm that says, "sing a new song unto the Lord," and I wonder, like the bird, do each of us have a unique tune we are to sing to the Lord each morning we awake? I think we do. It doesn't have to be actual song, but our praise is a praise only we can make, and the birds remind us to sing it out every morning.
WORDS:
What if we communicated in grunts? Or simply hand motions. But we don't. We have words! They can mean so many things, and like puzzle pieces we can combined them to form a creation - a masterpiece of art. Even sign language is based off of words. Words that powerful! They have the power of life and death, according to the Bible. We can cause someone to soar towards their dreams with words, or we can deflate someone. We can re-create words, learn new words everyday, and we can we can communicate a million different things with one word. Take love for example. LOVE, one word, four letters, that can mean so many different things to so many different people. I can love you like a brother, I can LOVE you passionately, I can love you sacrificially, I can love to write or I can love you unending. What a wonder we were gifted with the ability to use words for such good in this world! What's even more of a wonder to me is that we don't use them for the good they COULD be used for!
I could say so much more about the ocean, mountains, streams, eyes, colors, but then this would be the blog that never ends. My goal is that when life gets overwhelming in all of it's insanity, I look to the beauty of the little things all around me. There is always something to appreciate, like right now. I'm in Starbucks, and I can watch so many people connecting, I can see the blue sky outside the windows, and smell the AMAZING smell of coffee (come-ON you know it's amazing when you've had a super long week!). Yes, life sucks sometimes, but even more so, life is BEAUTIFUL.
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