White Winter, Rich and Full

Snow and winter and winter and snow.  
I like today. 
It is blissfully quietly introverted time. 
Just flannel. 
Just the quintessential 'Winter Song'. 
Just a little white cup of coffee, and on it the letter 'j'. 
Just one white candle which somehow blends the scents of mint and winter.  (MAGICAL THING.) 
Ticking clock. 
Cozy home. 
Day full of challenges suited to my calling. 
Challenging, for sure, but interesting and purposed nonetheless.



In this season of my life, I've been stunned into happy silence over and over again.  I didn't even see it coming, but many of the winding prayers of my twenties have been answered.  And more beautiful and better than I thought, which is of course how God works in this world. 

Generally they have been prayers about people who hurt....my family and friends and the dear favorites of this world who don't always get answers when we think they should.  My own desert places.  But this year it's been different.  Many things have been given new life and momentum.  The boat has turned in new directions.  The anchor of my life, my friend Jesus, is closer to me than ever.  But wait, in ever age, He never moves.  I'm closer to Him.  

Begrudgingly and gratefully, I have learned that when you pray for your people for years and years and years, you change.  It adds and exacts things at the same time.  So today, in matters of the heart, I don't look the way I used to.  

I kind of think that was the point.

Sometimes, in the hazy crazy, I think about this life I'm in, rich and full, rising up fantastically in front of me, and marvel in silence.  But at set times declaring the story is important too.  

So I gratefully say it again.  Life is rich and full, enhanced by people, old and new.  I am beginning to tell a story of love that I always hoped for.  Prayers, answered and settled, have shown the next steps of new and great big things.  Life itself has again become a prayer.  Even a changing season, which so instantly brought Minnesotans to winter, reminds me of this.  

"For all that has been - thanks. 

For all that will be - yes.'"

- Dag Hammerskjold