A Life Fully Lived

Sitting here thinking of all of the things I need to swing into high gear...and not feeling like swinging at all. They say procrastination has its root in perfectionism. In my case, that is absolutely true. I get very frustrated when I cannot do something the way I feel it should be done, and would rather avoid it than do it differently than I imagine. Real dumb. Real life does not allow for all responsibilities to be performed to the utmost. Sometimes we have to look at the big picture and just flat-out prioritize. I think getting rid of some time-wasters, like incessant internet research and too much television is going to transform my life in the long run!

Bible study and devotional time should never be pushed aside because you don't feel like delving in too deep. Just a few minutes alone with the Lord can transform your day. Sometimes just breathing a prayer or two and reading the few paragraphs and couple of scriptures in my "Jesus Calling" devotional by Sarah Young is enough to breathe life into my weary heart and prepare me for my tasks, however mundane they may be. I try my best to find joy in all of them...after all, it's a blessing to have the good health to be able to do them.

I created a notebook of goals in which I have recorded my priorities in general as well as specific things I'd like to accomplish. As the school year approaches, I hope that my decisiveness will guide my parenting, and some of my directed approach will rub off on my children. They are at pivotal ages for life decisions and, while I am a huge proponent of the idea that it is never too late to change your life's course, I want them to make good use of their youth.

Some of the distractions that seem to plague us all...workaholicism, over-doing hobbies, addictions that seem harmless on the surface such as television or internet use; all serve to carve valleys in our purpose. Yes, we must live lives of balance, enjoying many of those things on a regular basis. Sometimes people have to work longer hours to complete projects. However, if you find yourself, as I have done so often, carrying around a vague sense of unease because life seems to be flying by while your own personal objectives and values remain unfulfilled, stop the merry-go-round and get down on your knees. You may even decide to make a notebook like I did (complete with a master "To Do" list and checklist of daily activities that would bring me closer to the life I want to lead).

I put a photo of a completed latch hook rug of a gorgeous peacock on the cover of my "Life" book. It represents the fact that a life fully lived (one that conforms to the plan of the Father) is a precious work of art, harmonious, balanced, and beautiful.

Time to Put the World on Mute...and Crank Up the Volume of My Real Life

I did it again! I slipped straight back into the pit of Facebook and internet news addiction. Wow. One would think that the few days of peace I enjoyed earlier when I cut back on them would have been enough to keep me hooked. It's the same thing with studying my Bible and with prayer. I get just enough of a soaking of the Holy Spirit to remember what it is like to feel like a person again, instead of a strife-filled block of fear and torturous condemnation and back I go into the world, embracing the nothingness it has to offer until the deep-seated lonliness of life without Christ drives me back to His fountain of living water. I'm like the rat on the proverbial wheel. I go and go and go and get nowhere until I concede that God has all the purpose in the world in His back pocket.

EVERY time I saturate myself with the 24/hour news cycle, I get waves of anxiety and depression that plow me under. I cannot focus on the good in life, so much of what's bad is clouding my vision. I guess I'm just really sensitive. I know that we are barrelling on toward the second coming. I see my nation sinking morally and fiscally. I know that people are hurting all around me. The burden of knowledge without any way to help is too much for me. Those who know me well understand that I carry people's burdens in my heart. Even folks I do not know.

God has made each one of us with a specific purpose in life. Our chosen path will wind us through the lives of many people. Some of these people are family. Many are not. These are the people we are to help and pour out our limited resources upon. These are our divine appointments. Yes, it is important to know what is going on in our community and in the world in case God is calling us to give in a larger fashion. However, most of what He calls us to is within our arms reach. If each of us blessed and focused on those He has put in our lives, this world would be a FAR different place.

This brings me to Facebook, that portal of both astounding good (MY CHILDHOOD FRIENDS! MY COLLEGE BUDDIES!) and outright evil (absolute, stone-cold strangers commenting upon my life and choices). I will always be on Facebook, because it links me to people I love. People I had thought I had lost. Wonderful, priceless people I would not know were it not for the social medium. However, Facebook reinforces some deep-seated hurt. Old rejections resurface and are reinforced daily. Strange strangers who seep in through the cracks make horrible remarks and judge a life they've no part of. Waves of commentary upset or set my ship to sail on strange waters for hours. Facebook needs a smaller place in my day.

I guess the upshot of all of this thinking is that the internet, while a force for good, and an amazing resource for information, links us with too much data. It creates a constant noise in our minds, bombarding us with facts we don't even have time to process and leads to emotions that hamper our daily work. If you're like me, a housewife with an addiction to reading/news/information and social contact, you probably need to cut back on computer/ipad time.

The Blood of Jesus; My Righteousness, My Everlasting Shield

What does the body of Christ look like? Sometimes it is a friend you have not seen since college, stepping out onto a balcony at the beach to take your heartbroken phone call at 8:30 a.m. A very deep, committed Christian did that for me this morning. She was the face of Christ in a true time of need. Ever since beginning this study on personal revival Satan has taken one shot after the other, most of them hard body blows. Much of my turmoil and hurt revolve around other people's perceptions of me. Have I hurt them in some way (sometimes I have)? Have I done something to destroy my Christian witness (most of the time the answer is 'yes')? Did they hear me use profanity (sadly, they may have, as I have a lifelong habit I am actively seeking to break)? Will I be okay if they reject me (my college friend seems to think so)? She stressed getting alone with the Lord and clothing myself in the armor of my faith. I will be okay. I reminded myself out loud while we talked (well, I cried and babbled incoherent things and she calmly spoke) that this whole walk with Christ is not about me anyway. I have to move forward. I have to get through this. Any time I have ever made a concerted effort to turn my entire life and being over to God for His purposes I have been treated to an unholy warfare that turns my world upside down. This time around, I am determined to find the secret place in God spoken of in scripture. "For in the time of trouble/He shall hide me in His pavilion;/In the secret place of His tabernacle/He shall hide me/He shall set me high upon a rock." (Psalm 27:5, NKJV).

If I am to perservere in my faith, I will have to keep my eyes fully on Jesus Christ, who God says in His Word is "the Author and Finisher" of my faith.  I draw further encouragement from the following verses: "Teach me your way, O Lord, /And lead me in a smooth path, because of my enemies./Do not deliver me to the will of my adversaries;/For false witnesses have risen against me,/ And such as breathe out violence./I would have lost heart, unless I had believed/That I would see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living./ Wait on the Lord;/Be of good courage,/ And He shall strengthen your heart;/Wait, I say, on the Lord!" (Psalm 27:11-14, NKJV) Our primary adversary who accuses us constantly is, of course, Satan. I have devised a new strategy against him when he brings condemnation, or perhaps leads others to heap condemnation on me. I will say, audibly if need be, "That is interesting. Yes, you may be right about all of those sins I have committed and weaknesses I seem to carry. Yes. However, the discussion is closed unless you can bring something that is strong enough to stand up to the BLOOD OF JESUS. Until then, I will be happy to apologize for things I have done to hurt others, but this booth is closed for shame and guilt. (Dusts hands. Smiles broadly.)

I guess, to summarize, I am beginning to see that a lot of my walk with Christ will be solitary. It will be me and Him alone in some of the narrows. I will have to seek Him with ALL I have. I can rest assured that He will be found That is comforting to an astronomical degree. When King Asa turned his heart and his nation toward God, the Word says: "but when in their trouble they turned to the Lord God of Israel, and sought Him, He was found by them." (2 Chronicles 15:4, NKJV). And, finally, a favorite verse, one that gives us a peek into the loving, Father heart of God: "For the eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth, to show Himself strong on behalf of those whose heart is loyal to Him." (2 Chronicles 16:9, NKJV)

The One-Hundred-Forty-Pound Hummingbird of Jaclyn Court...Now There's a Visual

Last night I discovered something very important about myself. Something I probably should already have known. I have always thought my quick and explosive temper was the main gateway to sin and misdirection in my life, the one thing standing between me and true intimacy with God, but now I know the truth. It is FEAR! Most of the bone-headed mistakes I make, such as rapid-fire emails and hasty phone calls to "defend" myself or my children are firmly rooted and grounded in fear. Fear of being thought of incorrectly. Fear of being taken advantage of. Fear of losing someone I love. The list goes on into eternity. Even my temper, which I have been frank about in this blog, is usually triggered by some free-floating anxiety or outright terror. My fits at homework time almost always stem from the fear that I have been a negligent parent and that is why my child is unprepared. My anger with my loved ones is nearly always tied to the idea that I just don't mean anything much to them (and to some of them, I don't, which deepens my pathos in the other relationships).

My rage about things I cannot control (gonna cross stitch the "Serenity Prayer" at some point) boils over into outright confrontations with some people. I am getting more blunt in my middle age. Not always good. I get very angry any time I fear that I might be overlooked, as I have a root of rejection growing down into infancy, when I could not be held for my first few days due to a collapsed lung. Any time I am upset about ANYTHING, I want to take action FAST. The upshot of that fact is that I stay in a state of emotional upheaval and turmoil quite a bit of the time. I am immobilized by the guilt and shame following angry actions triggered by my fears.

Admitting this is a step toward healing, some might say. I hope so, though I do believe it will be a long road. Last night I just exhaustedly told myself that I MUST lay down my whole life to Christ. That means laying the fears down at His feet and leaving them there. The only problem is that they tend to follow me, mocking me all of the way through my day. This is the heat of the battle...spiritual warfare between me and the Holy Spirit in me, who Satan, my adversary, knows is formidable and Satan himself and his many demons who I know have specific tasks, as the Bible makes this clear. It is so easy for my to forget this and to legitimize all of my fears and insecurities instead of understanding that they are usually (always, if I am to believe that God has my life in His loving hands) lies. Here's what Jesus said about Satan; "He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies." (John 8:44, New International Version, 1984).

Where my Father God is concerned, I am afraid I have been acting something like the precious little hummingbird I saw yesterday when I took my dog Charlie out into my backyard. He flew in for a good look at me (I was wearing hot pink), but when I moved closer, the delicate little fairylike being backed up in the helicopter-hovering-maneuver-thing they do. He took a sip from the feeder and then went a little higher in the tree. I am curious about my Father God, I want to trust Him with my whole life, but sometimes I get so far and then back way up. Pray for me! Should have known doing a biblestudy on personal revival would rock my world. When the ride comes to a close, it will have been worth it. This I am sure of.

Sky-Diving from the Ground

A year-and-a-half ago, just after deciding that I would try my hand at cross stitch, a form of embroidery, I stood in Hobby Lobby looking longingly at a kit with all of the supplies necessary to stitch the scene of beautiful hot air balloons passing above idyllic-looking homes. I took it home with me and soon discovered that it was too complicated to do on the first try at cross stitch. It is on my "things to do before I turn fifty" list. I also own a kit to make a scene of hot air balloons in latch hook. My home is on the flight path for a local hot air balloon company, and I have taken countless pictures of them sailing over my house. I even exchanged a short conversation with one of the pilots one morning. I absolutely love seeing a hot air balloon in the morning or afternoon sky.

I do not know why I thrill to that sight so completely. I have an abnormal fear of heights and cannot imagine going up in one. I suppose it could be because they represent joy and freedom, somewhere in the recesses of my mind. The passengers had nothing pressing to do that day, so they took a hot air balloon ride. They are soaring far above those of us ensnarled in traffic or locked in behind a stove with full dinner preparations in process.

Last night I had a very, very weird dream, given my pathological fear of heights (I stood on the ground wishing everyone well during the last two amusement park visits). In this dream, there was a group of people with parachutes trailing them. When they would get to a certain point in a meadow, the parachute would lift up and inflate. In my mind it seemed that the person controlling "lift-off" was somewhere over to the right, but I could not see them. Apparently they were looking for all of the rope-like apparatus on both sides of the parachute to be extended before they would (I do not know how) cause the person to lift off. My dream opened with me only one person back in this line of people continuously rising.I watched as the person ahead of me quickly rose. My turn came, and, instead of the terror and frantic turning back and peeling off the equipment that definitely would have happened in real life, I just had butterflies. My chute seemed to be working in the inflation stage. I do not remember the rest of the dream. I do remember thinking "I can just turn back if the chute doesn't look right at lift-off, and I WILL!"

The imagery is so obvious to me. I can go "up, up and away" in my spiritual life if I will only let go of all of my fears and fall back onto Jesus. If I will have complete faith in the One who has inflated my parachute, I will sail safely through any storm and land very gently in heaven. Others have done it (the person who quickly rose before me in the dream) and I can and will, too. Faith is the key. The good news is that I do not have to manufacture that faith on my own. It is the gift of God.

Rough Night in the Sea of Emotion

Yesterday was a very, very, very long day. In one fell swoop, some dramatic developments left me thinking I might need a new church home, after nearly four years (including the year of visiting) that we have been at our current one, and a family member did something to hurt me that has me thinking yet again that I am a very weak person not to place firm boundaries in that relationship. I did not sleep well last night, being awakened again and again by dreams I do not remember today. My wildly swinging emotions sent me straight to Facebook countless times yesterday, hoping to chat with either someone from church who would give me some hope or someone from among my friends and family who could offer understanding about that other situation. Instead, what I reaped was a terrible lack of peace, an inner turmoil that matched the very brief thunderstorms we had last night. At one point while I was pouring out my heart to someone via the Facebook messaging system, there was a terrific thunderclap, the power went out briefly, jerking back on with a start. An alarm I did not realize we even had began chirping at a deafening volume, sounding roughly like an injured puppy wailing into a loudspeaker. Unsettling in the worst way.

I learned three things yesterday: 1) My new resolve to personal revival will be sorely tested. I will be found wanting, my Saviour will not be. He was here waiting for me this morning in my sitting room, the scent of my cinnamon spice coffee blending with the sweet aroma of the presence of God. (He watched me struggling to sleep last night, and he felt compassion.) 2) Facebook has no power to restore me or my relationships. It is a great tool for staying in touch, and for connecting me with so many incredible people worldwide who I would otherwise not have the privilege of knowing. But it is not therapy or a path to peace, at least not for me. Back into the once-a-day drawer it goes. My cell phone is my new best friend. I will call my friends and family. I will meet face-to-face with other Christians when I am lonely. 3) Friends are often more respectful and more loving than family, and they become part of our families when we let them. I will not be afraid to let them!

I Am a "Real" Person Again!

Wow! This television fast and cutback on internet time has proven more challenging than I ever imagined! It has been, however, very freeing as well. I feel like a real human being again, actually experiencing life versus just reading about it all day long. This simpler way of living has taken me back to my childhood, actually. In those good old days, children's programming was sparse, limited to certain times of day or days of the week. All of the other hours were filled with reading, using my imagination, playing outside. I have done a lot of reading, cross stitching and latch hooking and have been able to start my day with the new biblestudy on personal revival that I began with a friend a few days ago. Today I will work on my scrapbooks and try to get in a little writing, as well as setting my literal house in order. A couple of nights ago, Gary and I actually went out to see our friend, the albino doe. By the time we reached her, dusk was gathering fast, muting the landscape seemingly by the second. But we saw her! She glows white in the fading light. I could also make out the forms of a few of the naturally-colored members of her herd grazing around her.

There have been times over the past few days that I have been tempted to throw in the towel on the fast and click my set on! Every time, I thought of my sweet, committed Christian friend who I entered into a covenant with and walked away. I am going to do this thing! Taking the break from constant (I shoot for once a day, sometimes twice if I want to check in on a friend who is on the other side of the globe and is therefore asleep when I am on in the mornings) checking of Facebook has been liberating to a shocking degree. I was literally CHAINED to the comments and opinions of others, and they were pouring themselves into my life all day long. Now, I have more of an opportunity to allow Christ to pour into my life. I stand a better chance of hearing Him in the stillness.

I am a very fast and quite voracious reader of internet news. I am also an extremely tender-hearted person. I guess I was carrying the burdens for most of the world. Not reading news all day long has freed me from that and allowed me to try to begin focusing on the people who God has put in my orbit who I can actually have an impact on. There are always more of these people than you think, and God will always provide enough resources for you to help them without draining you to the point of death. I am enjoying a stillness of spirit, marked by waiting on the Lord. Gone is the incessant inner turmoil created by feasting on bad news (which I could do nothing about) and internalizing random Facebook comments others slung my way. My advice to you, friend, is TRY it! This kind of fast, or any fast which allows you to bring your life back into balance, simplifying it so that you can hone in on your PURPOSE in Christ is WORTH IT! Love to you all.

Who I Really Am

All of my natural life I have drawn my identity from an external source. I don't think that is all that uncommon. When I was a young child, I drew my identity from my nuclear family. I was John and Nancy Crater's daughter, sister to Tim, Leah and Mary. I got a great deal of my sense of importance from the fact that George and Frances Denton (maternal grandparents) prayed for me all of the time. When I reached the horrific, barren plateau of middle school and began drawing my identity from my peers, it was some serious rough going. All I saw in the mirror was a plain-looking girl not nearly as smart as my older brother. I wasn't jealous of him. Actually, I took some of my identity from his successes, as I bragged about him a lot (still do). He was a great example to me of a respectful, obedient child who worked hard. The mirror also revealed someone who didn't dress as stylishly as the popular girls. By the time I got to high school, I had decided that writing was my niche, so I plugged into extra-curricular activities like the yearbook staff. Soon I had a fragile identity based on a spate of accomplishments like a role in a school play, and the honor of being chosen as television anchor at the state's Youth Legislature in Montgomery, Alabama (the capital). I was crafting a resume for college, but these activities were far more than that to me. They were the blueprint to my identity. I did not have a boyfriend, few close friends and felt very invisible at school. It was almost as if my "resume" was the only thing that signified to me that I existed at all.

College was different. I had so many friends and came completely out of my shell. There, my sense of humor became my trademark. I soon began to see myself as the "funny girl." Still not really pretty or very smart, but willing to be silly on a moment's notice.

In graduate school, I focused on the career that was to come. I was my future. In my first job, I hit a terrible crisis of identity. My boss did not like me (I don't blame him, I felt that the world owed me a job). I started to unravel a bit. Just before meeting my husband, I went to the Lord and asked for Him to right my heart and mind, giving  me the truth about myself, rather than the lies I had believed for so very long. As a wife, I saw my identity reflected in how my husband viewed me. Since he was out-of-town five out of seven days in the beginning, you can imagine how that went.

By the time I became a mother, I was fully accustomed to building my self-worth and identity on external sources. You can guess the train wreck to come. My sons quickly became my world. That was just fine in the beginning. However, when they began to yearn for independence, straining at the yoke of my over-protection and over-control, my heart was shattered. This brings me right on up to today. I am not an empty-nester. I'm just an empty-cribber! Mid-life has found me without a career and with two kids intent on (and rightfully so) being their own people. I will not be able to take credit for their successes any more than I can wear the mantle of their failures as a mark of my identity. I will have to fly solo. Even if this time in my life had found me with a thriving writing career (as I had always imagined it would), would it be alright for me to say that that is who I am?

As a Christian, I don't think so. Secular psychologists would caution us all to diversify our identities...know ourselves as, for instance, wife, mother, friend, daughter, writer, Christian, volunteer, etc. That way no one facet of our identity carries enough weight to leave us floundering should it fail. I am coming to believe that Jesus only ever wanted us to know ourselves one way, and one way only; as his. I am a child of God, deeply loved and cherished. That is who I am. If I know myself that way, all of my other roles will be blessed by the overflow of my gratitude and my moods will be stable because God does not change. If all of my decisions are based on that identity, they will be good ones. No one area of my life will loom larger than the rest of them, throwing the whole ship out of balance. If seeking and knowing the God I belong to, and understanding that I am His is the center of my understanding of myself, I will be calm in the storm, faithful in the battle. Thank God for his unfailing love. Thank you, God, for never letting go of me as I waded through every season of life, my concept of who I was held on by a thread to things that change and move when, all along, you wanted me to see that who I am cannot and will not change with my performance, achievement, appearance or upon the whims of human beings who will love you in one instant and abandon you utterly in the next.

Peace and Quiet are Underrated

The television fast, along with a break from internet surfing, has created a stillness in my life that is startling. I see now how driven I was by the oftentimes meaningless noise of the world. The gulf between my spirit and God's was widened one ripple by every note of cacophony from those two instruments, the television and the internet. Do not get me wrong. I love them both. I see the great potential for good in them both. And, incidentally, I am allowing myself to hear good Bible teaching through the internet while I am "fasting." I am a naturally curious person and love nothing more than to sit down with a cup of coffee and research some obscure place, person or animal until my eyes are red with fatigue. Learning is good...therefore the internet has good in it! I have made friends worldwide through Facebook. The fast from both media outlets came as a result of my soul becoming overburdened by the information overload, my time becoming consumed by an addiction to said overload, and my heart leaning hard toward the world and away from my Savior, Jesus Christ. I just could not hear the still, small voice of the Holy Spirit anymore. It was so much easier to plug into an intriguing news magazine on the computer than to face what He might be telling me is my next assignment in life. A world-class procrastinator with all of the hallmarks of ADHD, I am so easy to distract it is mind-bending.

There is so much that needs pruning in my life. I pray that this time of relative "stillness" (electronically) will help me to draw closer to Christ. As I get closer to his loving heart, I pray obedience is the outflow. I foresee a much fuller life, albeit much quieter. I am the queen of throwing the baby out with the bathwater, but I have not ruled out the idea of making all of this permanent. Some addictions are so gripping that walking away from the source is really all that works. Maybe I could set a schedule that would allow some of my favorite, clean programming in...after all, Steve Searles (the "Bear Whisperer") told us that several hours have already been taped for new episodes to be aired soon. Can't miss that, right? God has brought me back, again and again, to the idea that moderation in all things (save serving, pursuing and knowing Him) is the path to true enjoyment! I think it is so interesting that once I closed my ebay account, thereby halting the bizarre stockpiling of latch hook kits -- five years worth, I believe -- up comes the very kit I wanted the most and had sought in vain. I was alerted to it by a friend in Australia, went onto ebay as a guest and purchased it. Each time I put a piece of yarn into it, I realized that God's design is best. A life lived in moderation is one filled with gratitude. I am thankful for my "Country Road" kit...which depicts a rustic village with small white church, fall leaves gently falling in the foreground. A peaceful scene which reflects the greater peace in my heart once I stopped the maniacal buying. Stillness has its virtures. I'll keep you all posted.

Another Postcard From Heaven...and Right On Time

I was itching to get to my computer today. So much is happening in my life, I can barely contain myself. Let me back up. I went back out West a couple of weeks ago. That sentence carries a lot of meaning. My soul literally feasted on the raw natural beauty of Mammoth Lakes, California and Yosemite National Park. My marrow bursting with that infusion, I made my way back home only to, just yesterday, enter into a covenant with a friend from high school to fast from television for thirty days. She mentioned that she was studying a book on personal revival. I couldn't get it onto my Kindle fast enough. So, here I am. Plugging into God with all that I am worth, ready to feel His presence and sense His direction anew. So excited.

You have to know where I have been to understand my current mania! I had gotten so low spiritually that, yesterday, before my Facebook conversation with Amy, I had literally decided to throw in the towel in terms of fighting some sins/terrible habits that I have struggled against for decades. Just decided that that must be how "I am." That I would have to accept God's generous grace over those things and limp on along spiritually until my outer shell flakes off and I am in His presence in heaven. So thankful God has so much more for me in this life than "hanging on until heaven!" So thankful that He uses his people to minister to me when I am on spiritual life support.

I have to share something that some of you, well, okay, many of you, will not be able to relate to completely, or in a concrete sense. Bear with me, though, because you should be able to apply it to your own heart's desires. I watched the limited run series "The Bear Whisperer" on Animal Planet this past spring. My heart leapt up into my throat as I looked at the gorgeous scenery in the city of Mammoth Lakes, California playing by in the background as Steve Searles, a local wildlife officer, dealt with situation after situation involving majestic black bears (many of which were honey blonde or brown) coming into town, or even into people's homes. I enjoy spotting wildlife, and had never seen a bear up close. "I HAVE TO GO TO MAMMOTH LAKES!" I said to my husband. I never dreamed he would actually put together a trip for me, but he did. We actually stayed in a lodge that had been part of an episode in which a cub was in a tree in the courtyard. I was so thrilled!

After a couple of days in Mammoth Lakes I still had not seen a bear and was a little down in the mouth. A cashier at the local grocery store told me to go hang out at the local lakes. Down to Lake Mary Gary and I went that evening at dusk. "God, I know I do not deserve your mercy, but you always give it to me anyway, because You are a better person than I am," I prayed inwardly. I was laughing at my own unspiritual prayer as we circled the tiny lake in our car. Suddenly, Gary said "There's one right there!" Seventy-five feet from my car a young bear sniffed around a camping spot.
I took a few pictures from my car. Another lap or so around the lake and we saw another bear cross a little spot in the lake and begin to wind its way around the shore. I jumped out of the car and went down closer with my camera. My pictures were not very good, because the light was poor, but I had seen a BEAR! Close enough to enjoy its lumbering pace, big feet, beautiful, soft-looking blonde coat. I had entered its world. I guess I was getting a bit too close because Gary started to call my name and to point at a park ranger's truck that had pulled in beside him with his eyebrows raised as if to say "You better back away or you're in trouble with the law!" As I made my way up the little hill to Gary, I saw that the truck was driven by the "Bear Whisperer" himself, Steve Searles. We met him, I had my picture taken with him, and we enjoyed a nice conversation about bears in Mammoth Lakes. I guess no prayer is too goofy for God to hear and enjoy answering. I guess it really is true that, as He did with the Israelites, He enjoys drawing us close to Him with his "lovingkindness." Take that, demons of dead religiosity!!