Discarded

Photo taken May 9: The wheat has turned much more golden in just 1 week.

Wouldn't it be great if we could toss our troubles aside as quickly as we can peel off layers of clothing during a walk on a hot day? 

This week has had its moments:

• On Monday, I locked my keys - and my phone - in the car when I was filling up at the co-op. 

• Yesterday, I couldn't access my email account. It's the account I've had since my very first computer. I will admit it: I'm a bit of an email (and Internet) addict. But yesterday, I had an obligation for which I absolutely, positively HAD to have email access.

• And, of course, as life happens, there have been other little crises along the way this week.

OK. I admit it. Those problems don't appear very monumental as I type them here in black and white. I kept telling myself that yesterday, too, but it didn't keep my stomach from being tied in knots or my head being squeezed in a vice. 

It's all well and good to read my Bible and a book like "One Thousand Gifts" by Ann Voskamp (also the author of the blog, A Holy Experience) in the morning. But, if 10 minutes after I close the covers and mark my place I've forgotten the message of giving thanks in all things, then what's the point?

Do not be anxious about anything,

 but in every situation, 

by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving,

present your requests to God.

Philippians 4:6

Hmmmmm ... Give thanks when you inadvertently hit the lock button on the way out of the car and the door shuts? With keys on the inside? With the cell phone on the other side of the locked door? (Thanks that it was during business hours, and my friends at the co-op let me use the phone and wait in air-conditioned comfort - complete with great conversation - while help arrived. Thanks that it was on the way home from accompanying at school and not on the way to that obligation since the concert is tonight.)

Give thanks when your well-ordered plan and to-do list has to fall by the wayside when technology fails? (Thanks that it forced me to make a change from an antiquated email account to something new. Well, I'm still working on being truly thankful for that one since I'm still trying to notify my gigantic email list.)

I'm a work in progress, to be sure.   

And again, believe me when I say that I know these are teeny-tiny stumbling stones along life's path when compared to mountains like cancer or unexpected death or job loss or tornadoes or ... or ... or ...

Wouldn't it be nice if I could leave those troubles alongside the road like I did that shirt? And I can. The key is to not pick the troubles and worries back up again. God has it covered.