Where do you and I begin when so much has happened the past couple of weeks?  There were times when my little cup ran over with grief and I thought there were no words of comfort to be found.  There were moments when all I could do was taste my tears as I tried so hard to make sense out of what was happening in places like Nepal and Baltimore, Maryland.  And then I saw a fifteen year old boy being rescued from the rubble of the earthquake in Nepal after five days in darkness and fear. My Lord what a blessing that was!  I saw my spirits soaring as I witnessed one mother in Baltimore publicly chastising her sixteen year old son for throwing rocks at the police during a demonstration. I remembered the words of Howard Thurman: “life is antecedent and consequences, reaping and sowing darkness and light, joy and sorrow.” Yes my friends life is like that! And it is up to us to find a balance.

    So many who respond to my writings on this blog often begin their words with “I woke up this morning. . .” or they write “I was just thinking of something you said. . ..” There is something deeply settling about the very first words from our mouths especially when we are trying to maintain a balance for all that is going on in and around us. When your cup is running over for whatever reason what do you do to turn the situation around?  How long does it usually take for you to find the other side of that which caused your cup to run over in the first place?  And when you get to the other side of what has stopped you in your tracks can you remember how you got there?  I want to encourage you to take time to discern how you felt when you came out of the wilderness of an experience that caused you to wonder how you were going to make it?  I believe by doing so you and I can learn how to maintain the balance between the joys and sorrows of daily living. Life, as a matter of fact is like that!  One day we are riding high and our spirits are soaring with joy and gratitude.  The next day our spirits have forgotten how to soar and joy is no where to be found.  That’s life! I believe we are called to maintain that delicate balance between soaring high and traveling the low road of despair and heartbreak.  Aha, but how to do it?

     Those who begin their writings with “I woke up this morning. . .” have already received the first gift life offers which is simply this: “you woke up.”  What a joy there is in “waking up.”   One faithful friend who reads my entries sent words causing my spirit to soar.  How did she know I needed to hear those words and at that particular time when my own cup was running over?  I submit her words were exactly the balance I needed at the time even though I had no idea she was thinking about me.  As a matter of fact, it was her remembering a time of grace of sharing, listening and understanding which caused her to make contact with me again.  Little did either of us know at that first serendipitous meeting it would become a moment of balance.  Here are the words she shared with me which I now share with you with the hope they may help you to find your balance:

     Let your mind be quiet, realizing the beauty of the world, and the immense, the boundless treasures that it holds in store.  All that you have within you, all that your heart desires, all that your nature so specially fits you for-that or the counterpart of it waits embedded in the great Whole, for you.  It will surely come to you. Yet equally surely not one moment before its appointed time will it come.  All your crying and fever and reaching out of hands will make no difference.  Therefore do not begin that game at all. Edward Carpenter, author.

     Waiting is one of the hardest things for us to do.  When my soul is in the lost and found I don’t want to wait to be found.  I want to be.  But wait I must.  I must believe that I am not alone in my waiting-the God of my life waits with me.  The boy trapped beneath the rubble of bricks and steel waited and waited for help to come.  Surely, he though he would not be found and though tired of waiting he had no other choice.  But he did not lose hope and after five long days of waiting he was rescued.  I believe God was in the waiting with this fifteen year old boy and ultimately, that is why he was rescued.  You may rightly ask about those who waited to be rescued but were not?  I can only say their deaths became the tragic fact for them and for their loved ones waiting for them to be found.  Life is like that!

     My thanks for all of you and for Dianna who reached out to me in a moment of my need for discernment and balance. Come by here Lord, come by here!  Come into our hearts as we seek balance for our daily endeavors.  Fill the lives of those for whom justice has been delayed and not expected. Lord touch the hearts of those who walked the streets of Baltimore with hope for “joy that comes in the morning” and it came on May.1st. Send your Angels of mercy to the weeping souls of those who lost loved ones and friends in the devastating earthquake in Nepal.  Come into the lives of those who have come to expect injustice but continue to hope for justice.  For those in Nepal for whom the experience of the agony is real, please send Your Comforter and Healer into the middle of their unbearable pain and grief.  May we all find a pathway to peace and reconciliation as we try to discern what God is saying to us through natural and unnatural causes.  I ask all of this in the Name of the One who loves us unconditionally, Jesus the Christ and in Whose Name I pray. Amen.  And so it is!

Dr. Paul