Every day has its own bit of uniqueness, a surprise or two here and there. All we have to do is awaken with a willing heart to see, hear, and know. Even if you must follow a routine such as shower, dress the kids, grab a breakfast bar and fly out of the driveway waving  to the dog and realizing you didn’t tell your spouse goodbye, or good morning either for that matter, it can still be special. We’ve all done it; it’s called mundane. But as all that begins to grow old, you’ll realize there’s been a whole other world out there just watching you, waiting for a chance to please you, gifting you with an abundance of God’s grace. It’s called being still and knowing He is God. (smile)

I haven’t been posting my usual Monday snippets of life, partly because of the BUSY season and partly because I feel my enthusiasm over the daily grind of ordinary isn’t quite shared by all. Thank Goodness, it takes different strokes for different folks! If not, how bland that would be! But in a world of worry and weary, I just enjoy pointing out some of the fleeting moments that catch my eye. Those “oooh, something shiny” moments that take our attention away from the mundane, but not so breathtaking that we have to stop what we’re doing. Wait a minute – I just stopped what I was doing in order to share my little day of surprises – and it isn’t at all breathtaking. So, shiny, but not blinding. The Grand Canyon was one of those times that take my breath away; today is just normal stuff that makes life awesome, alive and blessed.

Opening the door this morning to find a gentle rain was my first surprise. It wasn’t storming, dark, nor falling loudly enough for me to know ahead that God had showered us with new blessings in the early morning hours. I now could hear all nature singing “hallelujah, hall-e-lu-u-jah!”  The Psalmist says of God, “You visit the earth and water it, You greatly enrich it; the river of God is full of water; You provide their grain, for so You have prepared it…You make it soft with showers, You bless its growth..” (Psalm 65:9,10b)

As I was doing the breakfast dishes I heard a little peck peck peck on the window that looks out onto the front porch, where my husband was sitting  with our Yorkie, watching the morning happen. This by the way, is a practice that has taken me 43 years to enroll him in but I think he is hooked. I stepped to the front door and saw the object of his attention. A sparrow hawk was sitting in our driveway no more than 20-25 yards from the porch steps. Now, being in a rural setting of Western Kentucky makes this no big deal; but actually having it to land and stay a while with people present is not our everyday occurrence. Perhaps I have falsely accused our cat with the deeds of “fowl” play! I ran to get the camera, snap, snap, snap – no, the batteries were too low to capture the picture; back in to get batteries, no AA’s to be found. Back to the porch where he was whispering loudly, “get my phone out of my back pocket” (well, why didn’t he tell me that in the first place?) and being a phone to which I am not accustomed to using for a camera, I fumbled, and alas, the hawk who seemed to know I was just about to succeed, flew.

Later, as I took outgoing mail to the box, I found Saturday’s mail was still there, including a large envelope from Christian Woman Magazine. I’d just about forgotten it was close to time for the September/October issue to be out! Inside is an article by yours truly, and even though I knew it was being published, there’s still that thrill of seeing it in actual print. The article is about the seasons of life, how change must occur, and we must let go of one to take on another. This can be so very difficult for so many reasons. If I can help any of my sisters-in-life on this planet to see the miracles of everyday life snippets, then perhaps that will give a hand up to their next rung on the ladder of life. We’re all on this journey together they say, so Happy Monday, or, ‘happy mundane’! By the way, if you’ve not seen an issue of Christian Woman in the last couple of years, I believe you would find it most enjoyable. Fun and/or serious articles, all interesting, by a variety of authors, sprinkled with recipes and tips for life and study make it hard to put down!

The more things change, the more they stay the same – a quote I heard a long time ago – meant to me that eventually you experience change so much it becomes ‘unchange’; and as the preacher of Ecclesiastes said, “there is no new thing under the sun”. But now, to me it means this: The more life happens, the more change we will endure, and the more change we endure, the more we will come to depend upon the One Who never changes, but provides a hope that is forever the same.  God’s plans are to give us a hope and a future (Jeremiah 29:11).

“To everything there is a season, a time for every purpose under heaven: A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck what is planted; a time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up; a time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance; a time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones; a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing; a time to gain and a time to lose; a time to keep and a time to throw away; a time to tear and a time to sew; a time to keep silence and a time to speak; a time to love and a time to hate; a time of war and a time of peace.” Ecclesiastes 3: 1-8