5:11 p.m. - Sunday, Oct. 12, 2003
Noticing.
I'm sitting in the church office. I should be downstairs with the youth group meeting, but I have so few quiet moments like this, I thought I'd take advantage of it.
I think I've been seriously lacking a "quiet space" lately. I mean, I try to have daily times of prayer and reading, but something's been missing. I feel like I've been lacking a sense of wonder.
Perhaps it's the constant distractions around me. We recently got cable, so the TV's on a lot. When I'm in the car, I've usually got the radio on. There's always something going on around me. There's just a constant buzz everywhere I go, and it's starting to eat away at my "noticing."
I need to turn all that crap off and sit and notice God, beyond just 'read your bible, pray every day' as a religious activity. I need to 'stop and smell the roses' as it were. I need to shut up and listen. God is all around me with about a thousand miracles per minute, and most of them go unnoticed. That is a huge shame.
So, Lord, Sorry for not noticing.
Thank-you for shadows on green trees. Thank-you for a lazy afternoon sun.
Thank-you for friends.
Thank-you for life.
I need you.
I thought of an interesting picture today.
I imagine God standing in front of me, holding every breath that is ever going to be mine. He hands one to me. I take it in. I exhale. And he hands me another. He holds every single breath I'll ever breathe, right up to the last. It's been said millions of times, but what a gift it is to simply be alive, to simply be in existence.
So thanks, Jesus. You give me breath.
Aaron
