Words Without Pictures

At the end of the day, God remains good, no matter what the day holds. At the beginning, in the middle and at the end of each day, each minute, each second, He is good.

Sometimes I let my worries get in front of this truth. I let them become bigger than what they should be. I invite them into places they do not belong and allow them to dictate my actions...and usually my actions that come from this place are not good, nor are they healthy. They tend to be a grasping and clutching, a controlling kind of mess. Pretty ugly, actually.

It can feel unstoppable, the worry rushing in. But it is not unstoppable. There is a calm to be had. There is a better perspective. There is peace.

You see, almost a couple of years back now, I was given a verse. During an intense and challenging time, I prayed for a verse to rest my faith on. It came. It came with a double rainbow, in fact. It was really very cool but better than the cool factor was the way I could actually rest my faith on this verse. The verse was and is, "And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose." This is found in Romans 8:28. All things. Not some things. Not these things but not those things. All things. All.

Claiming that verse, I was given peace. There was Someone bigger than all of the chaos that surrounded me. This Someone was and is working all things together for my good. Somehow, some way. Things were not out of control. They were out of my control but not His...and given the possibility of me reverting to that grasping, clutching and controlling mess, it is a good thing they were out of my control!

When I remember that verse, and really it should not be so easy to forget, given the double rainbow and all, my focus shifts back to where it should be. Calm returns. Even in the chaos.

Thankful.

Be Present

Sometimes it is pretty easy for me to look ahead and own all of tomorrow's troubles today. The thing that happens when I do this is I actually forget about today. My mind is so busy trying to figure out how the future will look, to see the hazy ideas of what it might bring and try and make some sense out of it that am not present here, now. What value is it to worry about tomorrow? There is no value in it. In fact, it takes away from today.

Don't get me wrong, to look ahead, to anticipate, to hope, to wonder, to make plans (knowing plans can change)...these are all good things to do but not at the expense of today...not if it robs me and those around me of being present.

As I was walking on the trail this morning and saw the dotted lines, they spoke into my life. Being present on the dotted line of today is what I want. I needed to get this shot. I used my macro lens and a shallow depth of field to make sure that all but one dot and only part of that dot was in focus. It marked being present in today. Adding a layer of texture increased the blur of tomorrow's dot, encouraging me to remain on today's while it is still today.