A lovely day, and a typical few days in Colorado - Sunday was 68 degrees and cloudless, then mid-day Monday a storm rolled in, and by evening, it was 28 degrees and frosty! Tomorrow it will probably snow, and then be picnic weather again by the weekend! 

Thoughts on patience

I am now so far behind on all the things that I’ve wanted to blog about that I wonder if it’s hopeless to try and catch up. Since early October when I last really wrote anything, I’ve felt caught in a vice grip of busyness and duty. More this year than last, I feel the pressure to be over-involved, over-committed, and over-worked. More than last year, I am driven crazy by the culture of busyness around me, the stress I see in my students, and the oh-so-North-American tendency to equate personal worth with activity.

Not coincidentally, the last week before break, I discovered that I can be quite a negative and cranky person when I’m feeling impatient to be somewhere else! Looking forward to this break at home, it was hard for me to have patience with students who don’t seem to listen, can’t seem to do assignments on time, who suddenly realize they’re in danger of failing and show up at my office door for help. It’s ugly to look at myself and see so much impatience and negativity. I know that it is the consequence of a heart that is not always resting in the Lord as it should be. I am aware of the fact that even though I know in my head that I should be going to God, clinging to Him for strength, encouragement and direction, I still can’t seem to make the heart-move toward Him as I should.

One thought I’ve had about this came during a chapel service at school last week – a friend was talking about the parables of the Lost Sheep, the Lost Coin and the Prodigal Son. Even though we’ve all heard these stories about a million times, I heard some new ideas in them. For one, the speaker pointed out the fact that, in the story of the lost sheep, when the shepherd finds the one who has wandered away, he isn’t frustrated or angry or scolding toward the sheep. He is ecstatic that the sheep is now back with him; he rejoices. What I heard in this story was God saying to me that He isn’t impatient with me, or with my struggles. I am impatient with myself, with others, with the processes of life, with having to learn the same lessons again and again. But God is not frustrated with me, or impatient with my wandering. He is just delighted when I come close to Him again.

Another new idea I heard in the story of the Prodigal Son was something I hadn’t seen before. When the son finally realizes he needs to return home, that the life he’s chosen is not fulfilling or joyful, he decides that he is willing to be a servant in his father’s house. Instead of accepting him as a servant, the father opens his arms and welcomes him not as a servant, but as a son.

I see in myself a tendency to behave simply as God’s servant, dutifully doing the things He’s asked me to, following through on commitments, doing what’s expected. But I can do these things with an empty heart. And God doesn’t just want me for a servant. He doesn’t NEED me for His servant. No, He wants me for His daughter. He wants me close to Him – more than anything I might do or think I’m offering.

Why is this a harder position to accept? Because intimacy is scarier, and demands more?

I don’t know. But right now, as I type this in the comfortable new guestroom at my parent’s new house, I have a million thoughts going through my head. I’m struggling to find time in this busy week of meetings and errands and reunions to sit still and be with God. I’m struggling to lay down a pile of anxieties and duties of the coming weeks and months. I’m blessed by conversations with friends – conversations about real discipleship, real following of Jesus. I’m tired, a little weary, but so filled by the site of snow on mountains and the gold colors of late autumn leaves.

New procrastination tools, same result...

Somehow, somewhere, the computer programers of the world keep coming up with new and exciting ways of enabling me to squander my time. This week, it is the map function on Flckr, which allows you to link all the photos on your site to the geographic location where they were taken, by syncing them with the GoogleMaps program. So, after culling through six months of photos, deleting numerous files, and geographically tagging the rest... you get the picture.

Things that I think are perfect today:

1. The sunlight across the table (first one, by the window) at Gorman's teahouse
2. Geisha chocolate, with crushed hazelnut filling
3. A clean kitchen counter, after the dishes have been washed and stacked in the drain
4. An empty apartment when I can listen to...
5. Patty Griffin
6. Writing a handwritten letter to a friend
7. My Dansko shoes
8. Good Earth tea, made by the pot-full
9. Taking time to tweak the words of a poem until they're perfect
10. Knowing

My gramma...

Opal Virgina Anderson Stewart
Nov. 23, 1918-Oct. 3, 2006
Age: 87

Residence: Greeley

Tribute: Opal Virginia Stewart was born in Greeley to Bert A. and Hannah (Holm) Anderson.
On Aug. 25, 1940, she married Glen C. Stewart at Bethel Baptist Church in Greeley.

Mrs. Stewart graduated from Greeley High School and Colorado State Teacher's College, now the University of Northern Colorado, in 1957. She taught for 16 years, teaching first and third grades in Brighton. She loved her Lord, teaching small children and gardening. She enjoyed traveling and seeing God's creation.

Born and raised in Greeley, Mrs. Stewart moved with her husband to Minneapolis, Minn., where she helped put him through school. They were pastors in a number of churches in Iowa, Michigan and Colorado.

Mrs. Stewart died Tuesday at the Hospice and Palliative Care of Northern Colorado inpatient unit in Greeley.

Survivors: Her husband, Glen Charles Stewart of Greeley; two daughters, Carol Hansen and husband Larry of White Bear Lake, Minn., and Joyce Deese and husband Barry of Thornton; a son, David Stewart and wife Karen of Milliken; a brother, Clifford Anderson and wife Crystal of Denver; eight grandchildren, Christopher Hansen and wife Jessica of White Bear Lake, David Hansen of New York, Jennifer Stewart of Klaipedia, Lithuania, Kristina Spaeth and husband David of Westminster, Karolyn Stewart of Greeley, Joel Stewart of St. Paul, Minn., and Heather Deese and Hollie Deese, both of Thornton; and a great-grandchild, Amelie Hansen of White Bear Lake.

Preceded in death by: Her parents, four sisters and three brothers.

Sorrows like sea billows...

Today I got one of those emails you never want to get.

Strangely enough, I had been standing in church, tears streaming down my face during the last song, but totally confused about why I was so sad. I left church and briefly talked with a friend, still teary-eyed, and went to my office, put my head down on my desk and cried. Yes, it has been a hard week, but not THIS hard, I thought! Why was I crying?

Then I opened my computer, checked my messages and heard from my mom that my Gramma Stewart has been in the hospital this weekend, and is now in hospice care. My spirit must have known something before my brain did. The doctors don't expect her to live more than a couple days now that they've taken her off her medication. She's been in an Alzheimer's intensive care unit for about 6 months, and all my family knows that it is time for her to go home to Our Father. We are excited for her to be free of the pain and confusion that have been her life for so long, for her body to be made into the eternal body her soul was meant for. It is a beautiful thing to have such hope.

Nevertheless, it was extremely hard to think about the fact that I'm going to be away from home these next few weeks, when I wish I could be there with everyone - especially my aunt and my dad. My aunt has had a really difficult time with the reality of what is happening. These are the times that the reality of what I'm doing - how far away I am, how much I love my family - really hit me, and it's hard.

In honor of my grandma, Rosebud Opal Anderson Stewart, (and my whole gypsy family, really) I'm posting a piece of writing I did a couple years ago, somewhat inspired and influenced by the book she wrote about her life history and time as a pastor's wife, married to my grandpa. She wrote all about being a new bride in a parsonage that overlooked a cemetary in Little Mount, Iowa during World War II. She wrote about their best years, when my grandpa was a pastor of a church in Muskegon, Michigan, where my father and second aunt were born. She wrote about the color of curtains in their houses, and all the different cars my grandpa bought and sold over the years. She wrote with pride about finishing her Bachelor's degree at Colorado Teacher's College (now UNC, in my hometown of Greeley), years after dropping out to marry my grandpa - and then going on to teach a whole generation of young Brighton first-graders how to read. She is an amazing woman, who I can't wait to really know and talk with when I see her again. :)