Beside Still Waters--Moments of Serenity inside Overwhelm

 Today was a beautiful day, watched from inside my house where I was scrambling all day long until about two o'clock when I knew that I really must go outside and get some sunshine and fresh air. I had been keeping meals on for the guys, including an extra guy working on electric and lights today, and helping Hannah with an essay as well as other school work. (All this while trying to remember to take my meds and all the stuff that you are tired of hearing me talk about anyway.)

I brought a little firewood into the house and then headed off around the fence and up the hill to the road and the mailbox. 

It was not exactly relaxing, because the cold wind was brisk and my hands were freezing. And looking behind me at one point, I discovered that one of the goats had discovered that one of her humans had gone for a walk and was looking at me and back at the other human who was operating the excavator, debating whether to follow the quiet, faraway lady up the hill or remain pasturing near the noisy but nearer human. 

I prayed the goat would stay. 

BUT  

you guessed it. When I was safely out of sight and headed down the fenceline toward the mailbox, I heard it. A distinct "maa!" 

No! I hurried faster, hoping that goat would stay inside the fence when I crawled through a low spot, and thankfully, I never did see the goat ever come over the hill. Perhaps the wind was bringing her bleating from way down where she was, I don't know. Anyhow, I arrived safely at the mailbox, pulling out three pieces of junk mail and one piece of something else. 

 

On the way back down the hill, I thought about some of the peaceful times Jonathan and I had spent morning and evening in Arizona where undone work was not constantly staring us in the face. 

And I looked again at the now-empty RV standing still there on the hill where we'd lived for months while working on our house. 

Me struggling to keep meals on for whoever was here, working in a very small, mostly dark space, and yet I couldn't help thinking about the happy memories.

The moments of serenity swinging on the porch swing a son had hung on a tree, 

or watching a sunset together,

or walking down the driveway just to go barefoot,

or listening to the meadowlark because I was doing dishes outdoors in the chilly air.

Now here it's been a busy week. I spent Tuesday traveling to the clinic in Sioux Falls (with Hannah helping to drive) and getting a series of IVs, staying overnight and getting another series of IVs Wednesday.

I tried to catch up with checking and grading weeks of Hannah's grammar and help her with her schooling while I sat in my clinic chair for hours at a time. Or I visited with both clinic staff and another patient who happened to be the wife of a man who ran the gubernatorial campaign for the South Dakota governor. Now she is fighting cancer, too, and I couldn't help wondering if down the road I'd be wheeled into the clinic in a wheelchair as she had been, hardly able to walk. 

But I must take each day as it comes, and yesterday came with a surprise! My brother Hoshea from North Dakota happened to be traveling through Sioux Falls on his way to help work on the little cabin the family is constructing for my mother beside Fain's home. After texting Jonathan and finding out that I was at the clinic, Hoshea stopped in for half an hour's visit! 

A rare window of time when his path would cross mine, but for half an hour it did. 

What a delight!

 

After stopping at Aldis and then Menards to pick up things Jonathan needed for his work, Hannah and I got home late enough last night that we got in on Jonathan frying two last hamburgers just for us!

And we had lots of stuff to bring in and put away and lots of dishes to do before going to bed. 

Definitely not what a lady who loves a quiet hour or two a day would consider being led "beside still waters." 

Though I had gotten some prayer time in while walking around the hotel I'd stayed in at Sioux Falls.

 Jonathan and I listen to an audio chapter from Isaiah each morning. That has been so special to me, as I love Isaiah. And today it was from chapter 62, the chapter God led me to the morning of the day Jonathan asked me to marry him in Kiev, Ukraine. 

"Her land shall be Beulah [meaning married]...For as a bridegroom rejoices over the bride, so shall the Lord thy God rejoice over thee."

I thought back to that day and I am so glad that even this morning, just before we would hear this chapter read on the audio, Jonathan and I had enjoyed a delightful morning time together while day was dawning in the east.

"You've been together almost thirty years?" a nurse asked me in awe at the Arizona clinic. 

It seemed unbelievable to her that someone could stay together with their first marriage that long!

 

God has been so good to us.

In the middle of overwhelm, He granted us so many "beside still waters" moments in Arizona.

And even though we have to seek those moments now to find them in South Dakota,

we can find them if we look for them,

if we seek for them with all our hearts.

Right in the middle of noise and overwhelm and busy schedules and piles of undone work and no end of ministry opportunities, we can pause at a window and decide that even if it is dirty, it is also sunny,

and we can have that quiet moment with God, beside still waters.  

We can sit in the van seat while a daughter drives, and walk beside still waters.

And we can pause on a grassy hill in the chilly wind,

or on the crunchy brown leaves under the leafless scrub oaks,

and know that even if our life is anything but still, He still does lead us beside still waters.