The Quiet Afters...

There's something magical about weddings.
It's almost like Christmas morning. So much time is spent anticipating, preparing, planning; mass collisions of different spheres of friends and family mixing together for one day. Comraderie and songs flow freely amongst the newest of friends. Just for a moment in time, perhaps, we catch a tiny hint at Heaven. The Wedding Feast.
Not surprisingly, on this earth even the most joyful celebration comes to an end. The Bride and Groom waltz off into the sunset on the new path they've struck up together, and the guests leave happy, but heavy hearted. Celebration is over; the music stops playing. We go back to lives full of joy and pain, laughter and crying, life and death.
Like Christmas morning, the celebration -- the joy, it's culminated. There's an end to the celebration; and the old and the new friends go back into their circle of familiarity, feeling so caught up in the joy of the past and the seemingly un-endureable future of waiting another amount of days till the next celebration.
But -- if Jesus compared Heaven to a Wedding Feast, and He will be there. What joy will there be when we won't leave heavy-hearted, because the celebration will never end?

Softly coming, gently changing

Mornings run like clock-work these days. The sun comes up too early and shines through the shade-less windows near the couch where I sleep. The puppy races down and jumps on me, licking my face excitedly wanting to be fed. Mom makes coffee, the familiar grinder whirring away reverbrating in my ears. Morning news, conversation and general chaos ensues. And then I get up.
I always thought I loved routines. Routines aren't always good. People make mistakes routinely, pain routinely follows hurt... and on and on. I wake up to routines, good and bad. We all do, really. I look in the mirror too long, criticizing. Pray. Lose my temper. Read a book to a sibling. Routinely.
The very thought of a break from the tempo of life as I know it is terrifying. This beat follows where I am, it keeps me like I am. That's just the point, I suppose. In order for there to be a new song, a next movement, there needs to be change. It's coming. Softly. Gently. Changing.