Author: admin

I was sitting outside my local car repair shop enjoying the early morning sun, writing in my journal, and waiting for an oil change when a young man said to me,

“I’ll wash it. I will. I’ve been working 90-hour work-weeks, and I haven’t had a  chance to get to it.”

I looked where he was pointing and  saw he was talking about his car, a beautiful white Mustang.

I’m near-sighted, and I didn’t have my glasses on, so I couldn’t really see the dirt and then the dent he pointed out. To be honest, I hadn’t noticed the car.

His car was his treasure, and I think he assumed I had studied it and was judging him for not keeping it maintained.

 I’m a firm believer in regular engine maintenance. But the appearance of the exterior and interior of the car?  If only he knew that the soap-box derby-looking white Honda van with the fur-covered seats (vintage dog hair) in dock one was mine.

I hadn’t noticed his car, but earlier, when he stood in line in front of me, I noticed how clean he smelled, how kind he was to the attendant, how polite he was to the other woman in the waiting room, how at ease he was when he sat down.

These, I think, were his real treasures.

We chatted for a bit about Spring Break in Panama City, about the crazy hours he was working. He said he was a bartender and a night manager; he didn’t mind working long hours. He was kind and affable with a definite gift for gab. This, too, was his treasure.

After he drove away, I wanted to chase him down and say, “you are confused about what people see when they look at you. They don’t see a car. They see a really kind person.”

The Bible tells us a number of times how silly it is to worry.

Today, my eyes are wide open. I am thinking of the many times, just like my young friend,  I’ve worried about people judging my actions, or lack of action. I think of the time I’ve wasted worrying about what people think of my children, my house, my hair.

How silly.  Most people are concerned with what they are doing, not what I am doing.

Isaiah says the Lord will be your stability when you fear Him. That fear him part just means that we love His fellowship so much that we will do what we can to keep from losing it.

I think what Isaiah is trying to get me to understand here is that God is my stability when my thoughts are on pleasing Him, not others.

2 Corinthians 9:8

I am very selfish with my time. “I’m working,” I tell my friends, my family when they call while I’m in the middle of writing. However, sometimes I feel like a big fake. How can earnings that average less than my monthly electric bill actually be considered a job?

In spite of this abysmal earnings-per-hour ratio, I try to treat writing like teaching a class. I would never stop teaching to answer the phone.

I will be in the middle of writing a passage set deep in the swamp of Northwest Florida in 1880. I can hear the gators bellowing, the mucky slurp of someone walking between the Cyprus knees. And then the phone rings. I am popped out of my world and sucked unwillingly into 2011. It’s very irritating.

But,  don’t my friends and family need me when they call? Isn’t it more Godly to stop what I’m doing, lay my selfishness aside and enjoy their phone fellowship? Isn’t that what sacrifice is all about?

I wish I could be like Mother Teresa, calm and full of the wisdom. She laid her life on the altar of sacrifice and gave all she had to help the poor.

My daily dilemma is this: what is my altar of sacrifice? More specifically, how much time do I give to my writing, and how much time do I give to others? God has called me to write, but he has also called me to be a mother, a wife, a daughter, a friend.

So when the verse says that God will give me all that I need to abound in every good work, how do I know which good works I’m supposed to be abounding in? Is writing a good work? Or is it better to help people? Or is my writing helping people?

I don’t know. And, not a day goes by that I don’t struggle with whether or not I should answer my phone while I am writing.

But shouldn’t this passage give me hope? “he who supplies seeds to the sower and bread for food will also supply and increase your store of seed and will enlarge the harvest of your righteousness. 2 Corinthians 9:10

In this passage, Paul is talking specifically about giving to the poor, giving to those in need.

What does it mean for me to give to the poor, to those in need? Is my tithe at church enough money to give? Is writing giving to those in need? 

When I first started writing devotionals, I pledged all my income from devotional writing to a mission in India that saves girls from a life on the streets, gives them a home and an education.

I’m not sure my meager earnings have helped many girls get off the street.

Peace comes to me when I remember the words of a wise writer, also a Christian, who told me many years ago, “pay yourself first. If you don’t, you will get nothing done that needs doing.”

What she meant by that was this: write first. If writing is what you are called to do, get your writing done first. Every day.

She’s right. When I get my writing done first, I am much happier, much more at peace the rest of the day. I am nicer to my husband and more patient with my children.

Here’s what I’ve come to. I have to believe that God is bigger than I can even imagine. I have to believe that if I earnestly seek his guidance through daily scripture study, fellowship with Christian friends, consistent praise and worship, that God will guide me. He will give me the insight that I need moment by moment, day by day. It’s the manna story all over again. I have to stop worrying about the promised land, and walk down the road I see ahead of me right now.

Amen.