I hope this has been a good week for you so far. My father used to say, “You know its a good day when you wake up this side of the dirt.” There’s some real truth to that. When we are blessed to wake up to another day, we have another opportunity to see and experience the goodness of God. We also have the chance to make it a good day for those around us with how we interact with them. It might be the grocery store worker, our co-worker, the barber, the waitstaff person, the postal worker, the driver in the car next to us/ahead of us/behind us. It could be as close to home as our partner/spouse, mother/father/sister/brother.
Every moment of our awake time can be spent on focusing on what we don’t have, how bad, or anxious, or fearful we are. We can spend our precious time mulling over, chewing on, holding on to all the things that have angered or upset us. Is this really why God has allowed us to see another day? Or should each new day bring with it a fresh outlook and perspective that leads us to count our blessings and see the love in those around us?
God doesn’t wake the world up each day for it to be mired in worry, fear, anger, division, or hatred. God wakes us up to give us another day to make a difference in our lives and other’s lives.
Back to how your week has been so far. Mine hasn’t been the best I’ve ever had. In fact, its had its share of troubles. Those troubles, when I let them weigh me down and make me respond to others in very negative ways. When I rise though, if I realize all those that didn’t open their eyes this morning don’t have the opportunity to give and receive love, it can change me in profound ways.
I’m really trying my best to be more loving, more kind, more forgiving, more of what God wants me to be. Focusing less on getting my way, making others dance to my tune, just acknowledging and appreciating the unique portion of God I find in others. Its not an easy thing to do. Sometimes we need a little reality check, a little course correction. I know for me, I need to listen more to what others need from me, so that I can experience how God is revealed in them. We can get so caught up and focused on how we think things should be, we fail to see the beauty of how things are.
“Live and let live” is a well worn idiom, but it is really tried and true. As I reflect on the times when I find my day or week isn’t going so well, it generally means I have violated that idiom in some way. I let myself get sucked into thinking my way is the best way, my perspective is the right one, my thoughts/desires/wants should always take the primary spot. When we live and let live, we find the world can look different, we experience others differently, we see more of God and less of ourselves.
Friendships and relationships are funny things. In order to truly love another, we have to let that person be who they are. Its not our job to make them into who we think they should be, but rather to love who they are.
So, if we are blessed to wake up on this side of the dirt, and we can “live and let live,” we quite possibly will find our day, our week has been pretty good after all. May God well up in you and me, a new way of being. May we each see one another with eyes of love and acceptance, seeing God’s face in every person and letting that person show us a beautiful side of God we never have considered before.
Your companion on the Way,
Pastor Tom