Just Think

"Just think of Sodom and Gomorrah," Jane says. Tuesday and we're traveling together. "It doesn't take very many good people for God to save a lot of bad people," she says.

Blue sky and intermittent clouds, we glide down the highway to Grammie's, our drive the usual hothouse of conversation.

"Yep," I say. For the sake of ten good men God would have spared Sodom and Gomorrah. Would have.

"And God still did save the good people," she says.

"Yep," I say.

"Ya just have to make sure you're on the right side," she says. She directs the conversation with full arm gestures from the very back seat. "The right side in God's eyes," she says. Children chatter tangents on her words. They lace ideas, one looped around the next and the next.

As politics spiral, as the narrative of Revelation reads easier and easier each day, one thing is clear: persecution will come. Every ilk will find it. Ya just have to make sure you're on the right side.

I pray righteousness finds us, that we grab on with both hands, fall on our knees, and devote ourselves to the one thing, the one Person, that will make every struggle worth it. Jesus.

Gratitude:

5627. Spices. New spices and herb blends for the simple kitchen. We bake a promised land of food from the simplest ingredients.  The pantry brims with fresh stores.

5628. I knit three quarters of a new pair of pants for Betsy.

5629. Coral peach yarn, I plan an Easter sweater for her.

5630. A knitting book of prayer shawls.

5631. New jars for the pantry spices.

5632. "I lied," Joe confesses. Slowly by slowly he grabs on to truth.      

5633. We play Settlers of Catan again and again. Symptoms of good sportsmanship emerge.

5634. I meet a friend via e-mail who has a daughter with the same name. Myra. Such a pretty name. We exchange knitting stories, our lives parallel from different sides of the country.

5635. We work to grow the children in kindness, kindness in adversity, kindness to the ungrateful. Siblings provide the perfect lab.

5636. The children bake apple crisp for Craig and me.

5637. Jane begins to learn Come Thou Fount. Lucy starts Holy, Holy, Holy.

5638. We receive TWO letters from George. Jane started writing the sponsor letters, and we received TWO in response.

5639. Betsy starts army crawling. The turn of one night, and suddenly she is into ev. ery. thing. Bits of dust, curls of hair, scraps of paper, snips of yarn, corners of furniture, everything makes it to her mouth.

5638. I try to slow the moments and enjoy each one. Each stubborn interruption a triumphant marker of the great responsibility God has entrusted to me. I marvel at this fine gem.

5641. At each turn I find Craig. There he is, doing the last thing I needed.