All My Loves

I love bubble baths.  I love blackberries.  I love dancing shows.  I love high school football.  I love my crazy family.

There are some big things that I'm asking God to do in my life.  And, thanks to the faith I've borrowed and leaned upon from a few friends, I do believe that He's going to accomplish them.

But, there are also some very small things I've asked God for recently.  Things that would make me smile but have very little eternal significance.  Things I can easily live without but significantly increase my pleasure on any given day.  Things like bubble baths.  Blackberries.  Dancing shows.  High school football.  Family.

Last weekend, the football team that my cousin Steven coaches won their way to the state championship playoff game to be played this coming weekend in Killeen.  I was overjoyed for Steven and the team! Killeen is just 2 hours away, and all of our family were making arrangements to get there. What an exciting time!  Then, I remembered that I was scheduled to help one of Cornerstone's board members decorate her home for Christmas this Saturday morning.  It was a commitment I made a number of weeks ago and not something I felt comfortable trying to reschedule.  Monday morning, I talked it over with the Lord.  I told Him I knew I shouldn't cancel on her, but that I really did want to be at that game, and I asked Him to make a way or to help me have a good attitude about missing out.  About an hour into my workday I received a phone call from that board member.  "Kristen?" she says,  "I need to talk to you about Saturday."  "Okay," I said, forcing a smile into my voice.  I truly love and appreciate this woman and want to do a good job for her.  "Kristen, our grandson plays football, and his team is in the playoffs.  Their game is this Saturday in Stephenville, and we really need to leave the house by 11:00 to get there.  Is there anyway you and I could reschedule?"  I was laughing and a little teary eyed all at the same time as I giddily told her about the game I wanted to be at and we worked it out for me to come help her on Friday afternoon instead.  As we hung up she said, "See, sweetheart, God really is in the details, isn't He?"  Indeed.

When I began making plans to move from the house I've rented for the last 3 years, the one thing I was going to miss most was the gorgeous garden tub that had provided many hours of relaxation at the end of hectic days.  Many times, that tub was my personal place of retreat.  As I began looking at apartments, I noticed that there were several floor plans that offered garden tubs.  I didn't dare hope to find one in my price range, but I did mention to the Lord how nice it would be to find such a treasure.  On Tuesday night, after a particularly long day at work, as I relaxed in my beautiful garden tub, in my new affordable apartment, with my glass of sweet blackberry wine gifted to me by a thoughtful friend, watching So You Think You Can Dance playing on the tv that was turned just so from the other room, I knew that God, for whatever reason, had delighted to once again show me a gentle yet abundant kindness that caused my heart to swell with gratitude.

In that moment, in my foolish, finite mind, I thought, "God, you answer so readily and thoroughly the simplest desires of my heart, yet you leave the bigger questions unanswered.  Why can't it be so simple with other things?"  Shortly after that it occurred to me, the incredible ways He answers in the small things are evidence. They are glimpses of His attention, provision, and the way He delights to show off as the One who is able to do exceedingly, abundantly beyond all that we ask or imagine.  He truly knows my heart better than any other, hears the things I don't even think to say out loud.  The bath tub.  The football game.  It's as though He's said to me this week, "If I do these things that well, aren't you just a little excited to see what I can do with the rest?"

Yes, Lord.  Yes, I am.

Fringes by Shane and Shane

He stretches out the north over empty space
And hangs the earth on nothing
And how faint a word we even hear of Him
And yet – our eyes and ears and minds get all the candy

I sing for grace
For grace it lets me sing
And all I’ve ever seen or heard
Or haven’t seen or heard
It’s His
There is no other
All of this is but the fringes

And these are but the fringes
And all the world hinges
On His grace and on His word
It speaks things into being
And the spoken things revealing
The glory of our God and King

I’m stumbling upon things that aren’t mine
Things he spoke to life before time
Name one thing that’s not
One law or thought
He taught the clay
Molded it
Behold, He called the sheep
That’s why they came
Sheep! Who by grace get a peep
And make it cheap by calling it mine

"Behold, these are the fringes of His ways; And how faint a word we hear of Him! But His mighty thunder, who can understand?" (Job 26:14)