Friday, August 29, 2008

I will rejoice IN this day the Lord hath made.

"Some days the road seems too long and the climb too steep. Max Lucado describes them as days when "Hope is Hindenberged by crisis. You never leave the hospital bed or wheelchair. You wake up in the same prison cell, the cemetery dirt is still fresh, the pink slip still folded in your pocket, the other side of the bed still empty. 'This is the day' includes divorce days, final-exam days, surgery days, tax days, sending-your-firstborn-off-to-college days.

God made this day. He knows the details of each wrenching moment. He isn't on holiday. He still holds the conductor's baton, sits in the cockpit, and occupies the universe's only throne. 'We will rejoice and be glad in it!' Oops, there's another word we'd like to edit: in. Perhaps we could swap it for after? Or through, or over. 'I'll rejoice when this days ends!' Paul rejoiced in jail; the Hebrew children remained resolute in the fiery furnace; John saw heaven in his exile, and Jesus prayed in the garden of pain.

You no longer have yesterday. It slipped away as you slept. You don't yet have tomorrow. You can't spend its money, celebrate its achievements or resolve its riddles. Days are bite-sized portions of life: 84,000 heartbeats, 1,440 minutes, a rotation of the earth, a sunrise and sunset, a gift of 24 unlived, unexplored hours. And if you can stack one good day on another, you'll link together a good life. 'This is the day,' live in it!"
("The Word For You Today", 8-29-2008)

No comments: