Caution: Stay back over 100 feet. Not responsible for road objects. We’ve all been behind gravel trucks with these signs affixed to the back. They rumble along the road, occasionally spitting bits and pieces at your windshield. You begin to think, “Ok, these guys aren’t kidding. I’d better give them some breathing room,” and you put some distance between them and you. I’ve always thought it was interesting that they could claim no responsibility just by gluing a sign to the back of their trucks. Like maybe I could call my family for supper but begin with a disclaimer: “Caution: Not responsible for undercooked meats or burnt vegetables. In the case of complaining about this meal, expect long delays in future dessert distribution.” Or I could hot glue a sign on the back of my minivan: “Not responsible for speeding if I’m running late.” Somehow I don’t think that would hold up in traffic court. Still, they may be on to something with these signs. There are days when a little warning would be helpful. When a co-worker is in a snit about every line item mentioned in a meeting, it would be nice to read his sign: “My marriage is falling apart. Pay no attention to my outbursts.” When the mom of a kid in your child’s class won’t answer repeated emails and texts about what she’s bringing to the class Valentine party, you would benefit from her sign reading, “My dad is really sick and I am barely holding on. Sending in sprinkles on Friday might just push me over the edge.” Then, you would be able to respond from a better place. When my kids come home from school, frustrated by a classmate who just can’t seem to get it together—he yelled at the teacher, flipped a desk, made the entire class lose recess time—I put this “wouldn’t it be nice to have a sign” theory into practice. I say, “What he did was wrong, but we have no idea what’s happening at home. Your best choice is to give him lots of grace and let the teacher figure it out.” In the absence of WARNING signs, we can also impart grace. We don’t have to be doormats, offering no resistance in the face of poor treatment, but we can meet them from a place of love and understanding—even if we don’t actually understand. Instead of replying to bad behavior with accusations, we could start off with something like: “What’s going on? I’m worried about you.” Your concern might be met with more venom or it might be just the door they’ve been waiting for.

I was raised on the importance of Sunday school. Nary a week would pass without my sisters and me getting our Sunday best on (tights, slips, leather Mary Janes, homemade dresses), hopping in our station wagon or minivan, and heading to church. I was taught by flannel board lessons and word find sheets hot off the mimeograph machine. Puppets sang to me, exhorting me not to be “grouchy like a rooster” and reminding me that Jesus loves me “for the Bible tells me so.” Of all that went with going to church—the sermons and the songs and the sacraments and the sense of belonging—my favorite part was the stories. The Bible has witches and giants. There are heroes and villains. There are gruesome tales of battles, beheadings, and bad behavior. There are redemptive stories of angels and infants and everlasting love. We would open up our Bibles—the ones with the white cover with Jesus holding a lamb and sporting a 1970’s windswept hairdo—and we would sneak a read at Judges or one of the Kings. We’d read about daggers being plunged into fleshy, fat bellies or queens tumbling out of their windows to be ran over and eaten by dogs. With wide eyes, we’d read of a woman hammering a tent peg into the skull of a runaway enemy king or laugh at the thought of a talking donkey. Among my all-time favorites was the story of a man named Jonah. He had to be one of the most relatable men in the Bible, and yet he found himself in one of the most extraordinary situations. Jonah was called to preach to the pagan people of Nineveh but he just didn’t want to go. So he jumped in a boat and tried to go the opposite direction. Out in the middle of the sea, a storm blew up and threatened to drown Jonah and the rest of the crew. Jonah realized that his disobedience was the reason for the storm, so he begged the crew to throw him overboard. As soon as he was in the water, the sea became calm. At this point, God could’ve said, “Serves you right, Jonah.” But instead God sent a big fish to swallow Jonah and save him. It wasn’t until adulthood that I realized what that fish was. I had always assumed being swallowed by the fish was his punishment. The cartoon-drawing of the story always showed Jonah inside the fish with a lantern, looking bored or maybe penitent, kind of like Pinocchio inside of Monstro the Whale, just riding it out. But now I see the fish as Jonah’s salvation. When you read the prayer Jonah composes inside the fish, you see a description of someone falling to the depths of the sea with death as the only logical outcome. Then Jonah remembers God and cries out for help. Who know what kind of help Jonah would’ve chosen but what he got was the relative safety of a fish’s belly. For three days (the longest three days ever!) Jonah prayed and lived and prayed some more inside that fish. Finally, God made the fish spit him out and Jonah went on to Nineveh. When he preached to the pagan people about their imminent destruction, they actually listened and changed their ways. Rather than being pleased with their transformation, Jonah fussed at God. Jonah said, “See God…this is why I didn’t want to go to Nineveh in the first place. I knew you would forgive those people. Now I wish I could just die.” You can just see his pouty face and arms folded across his chest. God had had it up it here with Jonah’s whining. He sat him down in the time-out chair and said, “Listen. I’m fed up with you. Stop complaining about everything.” I wonder if God was thinking what other kind animal belly He could stuff Jonah in for another three days. Sometimes God sends what looks to me like a punishment as my rescue. Sometimes He gives me what I ask for and I’m still unhappy with the outcome. Sometimes I fold my arms and frown, sure that God has made a mistake. The Book of Jonah ends with God’s scolding. We don’t see if Jonah fixes his attitude or sulks himself to an early grave. For me, I want another chapter. I want to trust God and learn from my mistakes. And I’d rather get to that point without spending any time inside a giant, man-swallowing fish. We can do this the easy way or we can do this the hard way!

My friend Amy loves to talk about the forty years the ancient Israelites were forced to wander in the wilderness. Sure, she also loves to talk about her kids and her husband and her job, but she brings up those poor wandering ones pretty regularly. Over the past few years, I’ve come to realize how applicable their tale of frustration and correction can be to my own life. Imagine for a moment standing in their sandals: You disobeyed and you misplaced your trust. Now you will have forty years to think about what you’ve done. They had just left Egypt after several generations of slavery, and they assumed everything would be smooth sailing once they crossed that pesky Red Sea, leaving Pharaoh in their dust. But it wasn’t. There were armies to conquer and land to claim as their own. They felt as small as grasshoppers compared to what lie ahead, so they did what anyone might do in that situation. They doubted and griped. They moaned and blamed. They complained about the food and the water. They complained that Moses talked to God too long on the mountain, and when he finished talking to God, they complained that his face was too shiny. These people were hard to please. So finally God had enough. He told them that the majority of the adults—including Moses—wouldn’t be able to enter the Promised Land. They would have to set up their tents and wait out the next forty years in the desert. Remorseful adults would pull their children on their laps or solemnly stare at the upturned faces seated around their tables and tell them, “Learn from our mistakes.” Those children were given the task of remembering the miracles of the Passover while never forgetting God’s punishment of their elders. My friend Amy recently asked, “Do you think it was a mistranslation and they meant to say forty days instead of forty years?” Forty years is a long time, a lifetime. She said, “They must have spent those forty years wandering and wondering.” Did they think: Why are we here? What have we done? What was the point? Sometimes I find myself wandering in circles. Things don’t go as I plan due to events out of my control or my own actions prevent me from seeing the ending I had hoped for. Then I find myself winding round and round with the same questions: Why am I here? What have I done? What was the point? Maybe you are wandering in a wilderness right now. Where you expected smooth sailing, you’ve found only 100 mph hurricanes. I believe it’s possible for us to reach the Promised Land. It may not be exactly what we’re expecting, but there is hope with every breath. There is time to make things right. There is a chance for us to make life better for others and then for ourselves.

Growing up, I often played a game called Perfection. The object of the game is to match twenty-five tiny shapes on a board full of twenty-five tiny holes before the timer runs out. Let me tell you: it’s a nerve-racking way to pass your childhood—the ticking timer and the eventual explosion of all of those pieces. I suppose the moral of the game is to learn that the pursuit of perfection is futile…and stressful. I have a dear friend who is always wishing she could be more domestic, more like Martha Stewart. She wants to cook more and learn to sew. She’s insecure when it comes to the art of crafting (She’s the only person I know who has glued her own hair with a hot glue gun). But she’s just not sure where to start. Most anyone who does excel in cooking or crafting or sewing or gardening will tell you that you have to be willing to fail in order to improve. In our first apartment, I nearly burned down our kitchen while attempting to boil a pot of fettuccine noodles. I’ve sewed curtains that were too short and crocheted throws that angled into a trapezoid instead of a rectangle. I’ve hammered nails into the wall to hang pictures, and then I’ve changed my mind so I’m pretty good at filling holes with painter’s putty. And I’m still trying to grow a successful vegetable garden. I try and fail and try again. I’m not so much in pursuit of perfection but basic accomplishment and continued learning. If I am successful in any of these interests it’s because I was willing to fail. I hope to live my life in a way that shows I wasn’t afraid. If I’m fortunate enough to live to old age, I hope to tell the faces gathered around my sick bed that I wasn’t perfect but that didn’t stop me from living a life of purpose and perseverance.

When it comes to technological devices, I’m never among the first wave of early adopters. In most instances, I’ll come around eventually but it may take a while. That’s the case for customized ringtones. So when I recently decided I wanted a special alert for when my husband calls me, I searched to find the perfect one. There are endless choices in the iTunes store, but I finally landed on the song “I Just Called to Say I Love You” by Stevie Wonder. Though my husband rarely calls just to “say I love you,” I liked the overall theme, if not the accuracy and applicability of the lyrics. Why would I want to know who’s calling just by the sound of the ringtone? Wouldn’t it only take a second of reading the screen to see who’s on the other line? His ringtone was especially chosen just for him. It’s uplifting to hear the distinct voice (Stevie Wonder’s) and thereby know it’s my husband calling. In John 10, we read that the sheep know the shepherd by his voice. They won’t follow anyone else but their shepherd. The sheep see this man as someone they can trust, someone who knows them all by name. We all desire to be known. We post on Facebook and tweet on Twitter and blog on blogs. We may control the content of the information but there’s a part of us that wishes for others—or at least one intimate friend—to not just know us but to know-know us. I work hard to know-know the most important people in my life. I know one of my daughters needs lots of space and she doesn’t like people to touch her hair. My other daughter is the opposite; she has a minimum required number of hugs I must fill everyday. My son is an early riser, constantly in motion. He plays with the drawstrings on his shorts when he’s deep in concentration on the soccer field. But I want my children to know they are not only known by me and their dad, but also known by God. Psalm 139 says, “You have searched me, Lord, and you know me…Before a word is on my tongue you, Lord, know it completely. You hem me in behind and before, and you lay your hand upon me.” If you continue to read John 10 and Christ’s description of the Good Shepherd, you see that the shepherd is willing to lay down his life—his actual body—in the way of a hungry wolf. The one who knows his sheep inside and out is the one willing to die for them.

Waking up in our home in Memphis on July 22, 2003, we saw just what a few minutes of severe weather could do to a city. There were no tornadoes or flooding. It was just a thunderstorm but with 100 M.P.H. winds. This storm, later called “Hurricane Elvis,” brought that busy city to a grinding halt. I don’t fully understand what happens when we lose power during a thunderstorm. But in this case, even to someone who knows nothing about running a power grid, anyone could see the power lines flapping in the wind and the electricity poles splintered in half and lying across the road and know that this was going to be a long repair process. More than half of the homes and businesses were without power. Our street didn’t get the lights turned back on for 13 days. For the first few days, there was concern that the water wasn’t properly sanitized so we were cautioned from drinking or cooking with it. We had one-year old twins at the time. On the first day after the storm, I loaded my girls in the car and we drove to the closest grocery store. I planned to pick up a few necessary items to get us through the day. When I got there an hour after the store had opened, I saw that the shelves were nearly empty. Like I was suddenly dropped in the middle of a grocery store game show, I planned my course of action. I sped the double stroller to the breakfast aisle where I quickly grabbed a box of off-brand Cheerios and a dented can of peaches, and then I headed to the dairy section. The dairy cases were locked shut; a heavy chain snaked through the handles with a padlock in the center. A woman was pleading with the store manager to sell her milk for her baby. The man firmly but kindly told her he couldn’t do it. He said the power was out at the store and the generators had just kicked on so the milk had been unrefrigerated for too long and was not for sale. The panicked mother fell to her knees, wailing. I took that as my cue to leave. I returned the items I had planned to buy to the nearest shelf and took my girls home. The girls and I stayed in Memphis for the rest of the week, but my husband eventually drove us to Nashville to stay with my parents. The heat finally beat us. When I look back on that week without electricity, for the most part, I don’t remember being afraid for my safety or for the safety of my girls. (Luckily for me, this was before the post-apocalypse/zombie craze hit our popular culture.) The only time I really remember feeling scared was when I drove at night. Without streetlights or traffic lights or lights shining through the windows of homes, a driver can lose her bearings easily. I would pass through intersections without stopping because I didn’t know I had approached one until I saw headlights coming down the cross street. Light is something you can’t fully appreciate until it’s gone. It’s no wonder we associate grief and wickedness with the absence of light. When you search for the word “light” in the Old Testament, you find an abundance of examples in the Book of Job and in the Psalms. The authors plead for light and the clarity it brings. In the dark, he is weary and afraid. He feels alone. In the Gospels, Jesus claims over and over that he is the light. He asks us to accept his offering of light, which will bring goodness, peace, and direction. After we receive it, we are charged to let his light shine through us for everyone to see. I’ve seen the confusion and hurt darkness can bring. Let’s choose to embrace this offered light!

This summer, I’ve introduced my teen daughters to the incomparable and unfortunately unrealistic world of Jane Austen. She’s one of my all-time favorite authors. With characters like sassy Elizabeth Bennett and confident Emma Woodhouse, Austen makes us believe romance is not just possible but nearly inevitable if we are only clever enough to snag a good one. Even though we’ve been watching beautifully made mini-series and movie versions of her novels, the stories and language are from the early 1800’s and can be a bit confusing. The restrictions of class and culture and the flowery phrases often require a little explanation. So when my daughter continually asks questions like, “Who’s that?” and “Why is he angry?” and “Is she going to marry him?” over the hour or so it takes to complete an episode, I slowly unravel. Although I will pause the scene if I think the plotline has hit a confusing twist, my basic response is “just watch.” I may say that phrase a dozen times in the space of an hour. I want her to uncover the story as it was designed to be uncovered. I’m sure Austen was very particular about the order of events and how much she wanted to divulge the back story of her characters to her readers at key points. And who am I to mess with Jane Austen’s plan? My plea for my daughter to “just watch” mostly doesn’t deter her from continuing to ask what’s going to happen next. But, as someone who knows exactly how the story will end (Mr. Darcy will come around and fall for Elizabeth! I promise!), I can confidently tell her to wait on the story to unfold. As I wait to see how our family’s story will unfold—specifically if we’ll ever be permitted to bring home our son we’ve adopted from Africa—I hear God telling me to “just watch.” It’s supremely frustrating and not the answer I’m looking for. I want to hear guarantees. I want promises that the closing credits will roll past a scene showing a family of six holding hands with smiles all around. I’ve grown to hate the sentence: “God’s timing is perfect.” When well-meaning friends say those four words to me, I want to punch them in the throat. Of course, I don’t resort to violence in those moments for a variety of reasons. One of which is because I know they’re right but that doesn’t take away from the fact that I don’t like hearing my pain reduced to the equivalent of the inside of a greeting card. Often, those words are said as if my frustrations reveal a character flaw. It’s as if they know it will all turn just the way we want. But the end is just as ambiguous to them as it is to me. Still, my reality is that I must “just watch.” I must wait and see what will be revealed because I don’t know how this will end. Fortunately, I can sit with God—the one who does know the ending—and let Him guide me through the unfolding.

It seems that at least once a week, I’m confronted with some previously healthy food/technique/habit/item that is now bad for me, if not slowly killing me while I sleep. For example, with just a quick scan of Facebook, I see multiple warnings: Presently, we should beware of Goldendoodles, spray-on sunscreen, frozen yogurt, and fabric softener sheets. Taken at face value, we must assume these things we thought were our friends are actually our foes, at least for today. And who knows what it will be tomorrow. It seems impossible to remain vigilant while standing on such shifting sand. With the winds of change always blowing and often toppling the things I set up as concrete pillars in my daily routine, I’m forced to set aside what I am told is the latest and greatest. Instead, I must boil down the stew of everything I hear and read and see. Then I can check what remains. I can see what’s really worth the investment of my time. When I perform this exercise in elimination, it’s imperative I remember Philippians 4:8. “Whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.” That doesn’t leave a lot of room for the unnecessary and the pretentious and the Kardashians. When given this simple instruction, it’s fairly simple to mark the good from the bad. But in spite of my best efforts, those silly things that often take a place of prominence in my thoughts will still be flitting around my head trying to distract me from the noble and praiseworthy things I should be concentrating on. If this verse was true when the Apostle Paul wrote it some 2,000 years before the invention of Facebook, it can only be more applicable now. It’s worth noting that the inspired Apostle encouraged the early church to “think about such things” for their own good, not so they would be a bunch of wet blankets, excluded from all of the fun. In the verse that follows, he says if we put these things into practice “the God of peace will be with you.” And isn’t a little peace what we’re all looking for?

About a year ago, I drove to a friend’s house to return something I’d borrowed from her. As I pulled behind her car in the driveway, I saw that her car door was opened. Puzzled by unconcerned, I shut the door and walked up her front steps to ring the doorbell. The person who met me at the door was my friend, but in a slightly different state. Her t-shirt and shorts were covered in dust. Tufts of dryer lint stuck up in waves all over her dark hair. She was frazzled and unkempt. Before I could ask her if she was okay, my friend explained why she looked so exasperated. She had driven home, unlocked the front door, and made several trips from her car to carry groceries in to her kitchen. After a while at home, she prepared to leave again but couldn’t find her keys. At the beginning, her search was calm. Finding the keys seemed like a guarantee. After hours of searching, she became desperate. She had even looked in the dusty nether regions behind her washer and dryer to see if they had fallen there (that explained the dryer lint in her hair). Where could they be? They had to be somewhere on her property. I helped her look—in the pockets and hidey-holes of the car and in the endless jungle of monkey grass along the driveway. We looked behind the dresser in her entryway and under the table in the kitchen. Every time I would start to look in a new place, she would say, “I’ve already looked there but you can try again.” Eventually, I started pulling up sofa cushions. She watched me for a moment, but left to tear apart another room, convinced it wouldn’t be behind the cushions she had already checked. When I lifted the cushion on the armchair, I heard a clinking noise. “I found them!” I yelled like I had won the lottery. She ran in the living room to see me holding them up in the air triumphantly. We could never explain how they got there or why she didn’t see them the first time, but none of the frustration and confusion mattered once we had those keys. I’m surprised she didn’t invite all of the neighbors in for a party like the woman in Luke 15, the parable of the woman who found the lost coin. My friend was exhausted but relieved. It went from bad story to good story, the tide had turned. My son recently asked me what I thought heaven would be like. I fumbled an answer about how we don’t really know a lot of details but we know it will be great. Now that I think of it in light of those lost keys, I wonder if heaven will be a 24/7 celebration. Our loved ones who left earth before us will be there and we’ll be in a constant state of delight. The frustration and suffering of our mortal bodies won’t matter because we’ll be in the presence of Jesus. Every worry will melt away and we will bask in the glory of contentment and peace. And my friend will be happy that she’ll never have to find lost keys or pick dryer lint out of her hair again.

Like many of you with school-aged kids, our family experienced the time-honored tradition of the Spring Break road trip last week. As required by (Murphy’s) law, there were ups and downs, laughter and tears. And throughout the week, I kept thinking my kids were growing up too fast. I wanted to make mental snapshots of those moments—good and bad—just in case it’s true that if you take a picture it will last longer. We started out in Gatlinburg, Tennessee (a.k.a. Redneck Vegas). Our son played in a soccer tournament there and we cheered him on with applause muffled by mittens and gloves due to the freezing temperatures. There were chapped lips and runny noses, but in spite of the cold, it was a memory. I watched my daughters, the girls who are teetering on the precipice of teenage-hood and all that entails, snuggle in one camping chair, sharing ear buds as they listened to music on my cell phone. Click. A moment to remember. After the tournament ended, we drove five or six hours to Charleston, South Carolina. While there, we rode a carriage tour, driving through old, antebellum neighborhoods and a boat ride narrated by the captain who shared historical facts about the firing on Fort Sumter. As I watched my kids peering over the side of the boat at dolphins swimming alongside us, I knew it was a memory. Click. Another moment to remember. Considering that four-fifths of our family enjoys history, this was almost a brilliant, unanimous success. To counteract the educational part of the trip, on the day before we left Charleston, we drove to the beach to find a small area (about the size of, say, five beach towels laid side-by-side) to call our own for a couple of hours. It was a mass of wind-blown and seagull-harassed humanity but it was a place where sand meets ocean so we checked it off our list. Click. Halfway through the week, we set out for Atlanta, Georgia. It was another long car ride ending in a hotel room check-in, but we were getting to be pros at this…sort of. We sent dad out to the parking lot three times to get things we left in the van thinking we wouldn’t need them in the hotel. The next morning, we toured the Coca-Cola Museum. If you’ve never been there, it’s a combination of propaganda machine, soft drink shrine, amusement park, and free sample bar. In other words, we loved it. Seeing my kids’ faces as they tried a horrible tasting soda from Italy was worth the price of admission. Click. The night before we left Atlanta, we ran out to get a bite of supper and got caught by an unexpected thunderstorm. Midway between the restaurant where we were trying to eat and our hotel was Centennial Olympic Park. We ran to the shelter of a nearby hamburger stand—closed for supper, unfortunately—to wait out the storm. Under the eaves of the building, we could see the fountain show with shooting water and pulsing lights and rousing, classical music. We watched the water show, punctuated by the thrilling notes of the Olympics theme song. Lightning, quickly followed by rumblings of thunder continued during the display. Then something wonderful happened: my almost thirteen-year old, my daughter who has never been a big fan of thunderstorms, slipped her hand into mine. We held hands and watched both shows—God’s and man’s. We were wet and hungry and a little shaken by the storm, but it was a memory, and a moment I’ll always remember. Click.

Last week, I heard a news story about snow geese. These majestic birds fly from Mexico to Alaska around this time every year. I’m sure the people on the ground appreciate their flight as an annual source of wonder and beauty. This year has been a different experience for many along the route, especially those in Idaho. Thousands of the geese have dropped out the sky, D.O.A. Wildlife specialists have determined they’ve been affected by avian cholera, a disease that kills birds very quickly, sometimes even in mid-flight. Oddly enough, for some of the ailing geese, their last action is to fly upside-down just before they drop to their death. What must these sick geese be thinking? And how about their flying buddies? Goose #1: “Dude, look at Steve. He’s flying upside-down. That’s hilarious.” Goose #2: “Not cool, man. I think he’s sick. Show some compassion.” When I heard this story on the radio, the wildlife specialist interviewed didn’t seem especially concerned about the snow geese population declining due to this disease. He said to use caution if you come upon a dead bird (Check—no one has to tell me twice to step away from a dead animal), but otherwise they’ve got the situation under control. These geese made me think of Christ’s words recorded in Luke 12. He tells the throngs of people who have gathered around Him how they should fear the Lord who can hear even the whispers we utter in secret. Then He says that the Lord—the same God who sees our guilt as plainly as if we had our every sin printed on our t-shirts and tattooed across our foreheads—this same God knows if an insignificant sparrow falls to the earth. This sparrow, worth only a few pennies, merits the attention of the All-Knowing, All-Seeing, Always and Forever. Christ’s logical conclusion is that He must care infinitely more about you, the one He made from His own image. The one He loves enough to count all the hairs on your head. I feel bad for those geese. Avian cholera is probably a pretty bad way to go. As a rule, flying upside-down seems like something only Daffy Duck should be able to do. So it’s comforting to know I serve a God who knew about the snow geese epidemic way before I did. He knows and He cares and He thinks we’re worth it.

When my son was in first grade, I was a chaperone on a field trip to the science museum. On such outings, the teacher usually assigns students to your care and then the fun begins: You have to withstand the pleading looks the students give you at the gift shop and open all their juice boxes during the lunch break. Being a field trip chaperone involves a lot of head-counting and bathroom supervision. It’s mostly easy and I always learn something new. For example, on this particular field trip, I learned about the water cycle. Behind the science museum, there’s a natural swamp so they use this area to teach about things like tadpoles, aquatic plants, and water conservation. When the young tour guide explained the stages of the water cycle, she held up a drawing depicting evaporation, condensation, and precipitation. Being an attentive chaperone, I was only halfway listening to her spiel. The majority of my attention was focused on the six- and seven-year olds I was charged to protect and prevent from embarrassing their teacher by falling into the pond. But then the tour guide said something that caught my attention. She said, “All of the water in the world is recycled. It’s used again and again. New water isn’t made; it’s just moved.” For some reason, her words hit me. Of course, I was previously familiar with the concept of the water cycle, seeing how I’d already been to first grade, but I never thought about the fact that new water wasn’t created. All the water there is in the world is all the water there is. We can dam rivers and dig canals and fill reservoirs but the water there isn’t new. We can even burst clouds with rockets to make it rain, but the drops that fall are ancient and experienced. There are many places in nature we find a cycle. We see it in the seasons, planets, and plants. The merry-go-round of birth, life, and death is continuous and yet unique. We see this theme throughout the Scriptures with references to new birth and dying to our sins. When Nicodemus, a prominent religious leader of the Jews, secretly approached Jesus one dark night, he was told he had to be reborn in order to see the kingdom of God. Nicodemus had a shortsighted view of the life cycle of humans. He only knew the part about birth-to-death. He didn’t know there was another birth available, a spiritual one that guarantees eternal life. Nicodemus must have remembered Jesus’ words: “whoever believes in Him will not perish…” when he helped to prepare Christ’s crucified body for the tomb three years after their late night discussion. As he poured the burial perfumes and wrapped the motionless limbs, did Nicodemus watch the lifeless body expecting to see this resurrection Jesus had described? We know it didn’t happen as they buried him, but three days later. His body was renewed and Jesus rose from the tomb, walking and talking and even making breakfast for his Apostles. The darkness of his death was only a part of the story. As many of us pause this week to remember this pivotal series of events, I’m grateful to note Christ’s sacrifice is enough to keep this cycle going. My life here is only a part of the story. And like the water droplets that continue to fall and evaporate and form clouds and fall again, His grace is sufficient. It’s all I need and it’s always there.