Look at the Lilies

"Consider how the lilies of the field grow: They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his glory was adorned like one of these. . ."  Matthew 6:28,29

I must not be doing enough of something.  Or I must be doing too much of something else.  Surely this new addition to my list of complications can't be right.  The Rheumatoid Disease has been responding to this latest medication; the therapy for Fibromyalgia has been helping me to learn to walk through the days of low energy or high pain; even the Dry-Eye-Syndrome that comes with RA is treatable.  Surely, I thought, this Bone Density Scan would be a piece-of-cake.  Breeze through this, and I would be home-free, nothing else added to the mix for a while.

But the results did not agree with my own assessment.  The Rheumatologist called right back with the results and began a new medication for my weakened bones: Osteoporosis, the nurse said.

How could I have felt God's Presence reassuring me so sweetly before the test, but then have another label added to my day?

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My Mom had Osteoporosis.  Quite debilitating for her in fact.  She had required a high dose of steroids for a one-time rare condition, and was left with a "dowager's hump" as an unpleasant reminder.  She refused treatment for bone-strengthening, and I vowed to myself that I would never be like that.  I would not become the one who required help, but would not help herself.  And so I hardened my heart in the process.  Work hard. Take care of others.  Do all the right things.

Ahh, God is so merciful.  He doesn't leave us alone in our hardness of heart.  No, He looks deeper to the places where our true desires lay.  And He saw in my heart the longing to draw closer to Him, to find new intimacy with Jesus. But intimacy and hardness of heart cannot co-exist.  So a chisel is sometimes required to break open those hard places. 

This stony heart is being shattered once again. When I thought it had been uncovered and opened more than was possible, God has found another layer, ready for His touch. 

Time to cease striving once again. Time to be still in the Master's Hand. No laboring or spinning is required there.  He will array me in the garment of His choosing, where my bones are under His care, and the beauty comes to a heart softened for Him.


               "Under Thy wings, my God, I rest,
                        Under Thy shadow safely lie;
                 By Thy own strength in peace possessed,
                         While dreaded evils pass me by."
                                                   --A. L. Waring

 




Linking up at #TellHisStory with Jennifer Dukes Lee today.