When I got to Alaska the trees looked dead and cold, when we got
back from southeast they were full of bright green leaves it went from a scene
in a haunted movie to a jungle and now leaving today everything is a bright
orange and yellow. Seeing the seasons change up here is so fun. It reminds me
how in life we go through seasons. This year I went from a season of being
single to married, but even more than that every year is split into seasons for
me; it's the carnival season, the offseason and the Christmas season! The
carnival is full of work and long days that are usually colder than I wish for
summer time, the off season is full of school and volunteering with Beauty Arise and the Christmas season is obviously when we leave Cali and head to AZ
for Christmas vacation. Each season comes with its obstacles and blessings.
Just like earth’s seasons. I have to prepare and plan for what is up next. It
makes it hard to live in the moment when I feel like every moment goes by so
fast. I am struggling to be all there when I feel like right around the corner
I have to be in a totally different place doing something extremely different
than what I was just doing. I am working hard at trying to live in the present
and yet still use my time wisely and not feel overwhelmed. Why is there only 24
hours in a day and 365 days in a year? Why can't there be more? I thought time
was only suppose to move at the speed of light when you are old not when your
22!? How does one slow down and take time to be in the moment when it feels
like you blink your eyes and the year is gone? I don't like that it is already
September, it feels more like I just got married a month ago not 7! Even though
it feels like everything is going so fast I have no time to enjoy it, I found
this great little devotion on how to slow down and be present, it may not
actually make time go slower but it did help me realize how to make every
moment count. Hope you enjoy:
Living in the Present
Recommended Reading: Deuteronomy
8:16–18; Matthew 6:31–34; John 6:48–51
When you were a kid, did you ever wish you could see into the
future? Most kids wonder what will happen to them as the years pass by and they
grow older. Where will they go to school? Will they go to college? What about a
career? Will they get married and have a family?
This kind of thinking doesn’t end when a person reaches adulthood.
Singles wonder whether there’s a spouse for them out there somewhere. Parents
dream about what their kids will grow up to be. College freshmen wonder about
their eventual career path; older workers prepare for—or worry about—their
retirement years.
Human nature compels us to look ahead with wonder. Dreams of the
future make the drudgery of work today worthwhile. Anticipation of future
events gets us up in the morning and forces us to plan for tomorrow. It’s what
separates a man from his best friend, his dog.
The Israelites in today’s story were no different from us today.
Faced with an uncertain future and an immediate need for food and water, they
started grumbling. While they’d labored hard during their years of slavery, at
least in Egypt they’d always had plenty of food and water. Now here they were,
out in the desert, and they and their kids were hungry and thirsty. Put
yourself in their place, and try to look at the situation from their perspective.
Chances are you’d have had a few pointed questions for Moses as well.
God heard them, and responded by promising to provide for them.
Those of us who attended Sunday school know the story well—each morning, flakes
of bread appeared on the ground; in the evening, quail covered the camp. But
they couldn’t hoard what they gathered, and they couldn’t store it. Moses
instructed the Israelites to gather only what they needed for the day—no more,
no less. Tough to do when you’re thinking about what the kids will eat for
breakfast!
Why was limiting what they gathered important to God? Because the
Israelites needed to understand what we all need to learn—that we can sustain a
relationship with God only in the present.
Our past is nothing more than the story of how we got to where we
are, and dwelling on it causes us to become stagnant and unsatisfied. We can’t
find God by worrying or dreaming about the future, either, because that just
makes us want to control whatever lies ahead.
Yes, we have concerns and hopes and dreams for the future. But this
story tells us that we can live out our relationship with God only in the here
and now. God longs for us to trust him every hour and every minute of today.
Be the Beautiful God Created You to Be
<3 Alissa
