Musings

Its almost time for that yearly slow down and take inventory muse. I generally do it every year around New Years, a sort of step back and see what happened the last year, and kind of gauge where I might be headed in the new year. I like to take some time to think about what I might need to work on or lesson to learn.

I keep a prayer journal. It helps me to stay focused when I pray, and because writing helps me think and organize my thoughts, it helps me to notice what sorts of prayers I'm busy with. And it shows me how selfish I am. Too much, I tend toward selfish prayers.
So every year I like to take a walk through my journal and mark the dates prayers were answered, and really see in black and white how the Lord is working in my life. It's all there, plain as day, in the curly cues of black handwriting against creamy white paper. Seeing it in writing, seeing it unfold beneath my hand really brings it to life, and really shows me how God is leading my aventura de la vida.

Just now, I was thinking about the path of life. It's so fascinating to me to picture it that way. I began this blog with that theme, and lately have been thinking of changing my blog but the adventure of life and the path and journey still seem so relevant to me that I'm keeping it. And I keep bumping into verses in the Bible about the way or path of following God. This evening I was reading Psalm 139.

Psalm 139
O Lord, you have searched me and you know me.
You know when I sit and when I rise; you perceive my thoughts from afar.
You discern my going out and my lying down; you are familiar with all my ways.
Before a word is on my tongue you know it completely, O Lord.
You hem me in-behind and before; you laid your hand upon me.
Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, too lofty for me to attain.
Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence?
If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.
If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast.
If I say, "Surely the darkness will hide me and the light become night around me," even the darkness will not be dark to you; the night will shine like the day for darkness is as light to you.
For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother's womb. 
I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well.
My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place. 
When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, your eyes saw my unformed body.
All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be. 
How precious to me are your thoughts, O God! How vast is the sum of them!
Were I to count them, they would outnumber the grains of sand. 
When I awake, I am still with you.
If only you would slay the wicked, O God! Away from me, you bloodthirsty men!
They speak of you with evil intent; your adversaries misuse your name.
Do I not hate those who hate you, O Lord, and abhor those who rise up against you?
I have nothing but hatred for them; I count them my enemies. 
Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts.
See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting. 

A beautiful psalm which spoke to my heart. May the offensive ways in me be shown to light, that I might be led in the way everlasting.