Altars of remembrance

Last night was one of those times that I could not get to sleep. I'm not certain why...perhaps because I had been tense most of the day. There is no severely difficult situation in my life right now, just the little foxes that come and go. Isn't it amazing how those things that seem small in the daytime begin to loom large as the clock passes Midnight?

There's a quote that goes through my mind at such times as this. I don't remember to whom it is attributed, perhaps it was that prolific writer....Anonymous. It is, "Never doubt in the night what God has promised in the light". Not many words but deep with meaning.

I have had people comment on my deep faith that all is in God's hands. That faith came about through blood, sweat, and many tears. As with the patriarchs of old, I have built altars of remembrance. Mostly mental...a few that can be picked up and held in the hands, seen with the eyes, or heard as in a song remembered which brought peace in a storm.

For instance, I cannot hear the song The Anchor Holds without remembering a day spent in my living room (when we still lived in my "dream home") when I literally was on my face...on the carpet in my formal living room...calling out to God and telling Him if He didn't meet me there I would die.

When I walk past the pond in the city park near us, I think of the year we spent in a house which sat by a pond in the woods. I would sit for hours with my Bible beside me, watching birds come and go, turtles on the side of the pond sunning themselves, sometimes hearing wild turkeys calling in the distance...mostly reading the Psalms.

Just this last Saturday, my son and I were driving home when he saw two young deer running through fields and warned me to slow down (for they were originally out of my line of sight). I stopped just in time for the youngsters to look my way as they ran across the road...safe. Immediately my memory brings up "as the deer pants for the water, so my soul pants for you".

I have written about the small teacup and saucer that sits on my bedroom dresser, perhaps the loveliest I own...about the day I found it at a garage sale...the day I'd been overwhelmingly burdened by life's circumstances and asked God for a sign that I was on the right track (not that He was there, for I knew that...I needed to know I wasn't lost on life's highway). I stopped at a neighborhood garage sale and there...in a very dirty garage...was the most beautiful small teacup I'd ever seen for only a few dollars...an altar of remembrance.

I have learned to stop and...feel...listen...comtimplate. There are times I will go to bed at night and thank Him for a comfortable mattress and soft sheets. Many times during the week I thank Him for my sunny kitchen or my living room which surrounds me like a safe sanctuary as I am curled up on the sofa with a good book...for I feel the security of being home...having been nearly homeless. Not only home, but surrounded by those things that make me feel secure...altars of His goodness...books, objects of beauty, lace curtains, flowers, greenery, pretty china, artwork, family pictures, cats...all brought my way as gifts from above as we're making our way through this life.

He hasn't removed all difficulties and challenges. As I've said so often, "This isn't Heaven, yet". But He provides us rewards of past battles won and challenges walked through without giving up...those items we can let our eyes gaze upon as we walk through our home or listen with eyes closed as music brings back the feelings of peace we first felt when we heard the words.

Remembrance..."do these things in remembrance of Me". For it is so easy to forget in the night what He has promised in the day.