Gnashing of teeth...

is my typical response on returning from a vacation, accompanied by weeping and wailing as the realities of life, and its laundry piles, hit me in the face. A vacant refrigerator does not empathetically respond to hungry, growing boys. This is where the rubber meets the road after having spent the last days of summer, the hottest ones yet apparently, in the cool of the mountains with its creeks and waterfalls. Black asphalt parking lots will singe the hairs right off of vacationing unshaven legs.

Basking in God's glorious and majestic creation, praising Him for all that He has given is simplistic when the temperatures don't rise above 87 degrees, and that's only for a couple of hours. Basking in the heat at 11:00 p.m. does not engender much praise on my part. Keeping my cool is no longer just an aphorism, it's an essential discipline of the tongue or in consequence, a revelation of a heart's overflow.

So here I am, humbly aware that my patience for all things is easy when my environment is "just right." My impatience for all things is convicting when my environment is the here and now. Straining my eyes to remember the mountain mist puts me to tears that I would as eagerly await the heavenly city's majesty.

This is indeed why the psalmist wrote, "He lifted me out of the slimy pit, out of the mud and mire; he set my feet on a rock and gave me a firm place to stand. He put a new song in my mouth, a hymn of praise to our God. Many will see and fear and put their trust in the LORD." (Ps. 40:2-3)

Today I see and fear that I would consistently put my trust in the Lord. For but His grace alone, my life no matter its environment would be nothing but disgrace.