simplicity

If you've been reading my blog for any period of time now, you know that I have one consistent priority in the morning:  coffee.  This morning's quest for joe included a run to the grocery store for sweetener so that I could once again make my own at home (I'm starting to get good at this... Bread Co may lose money on me yet).  On the way to the grocery store, I was listening to NPR and the one subject we've all started following like a bad soap-opera came up yet again:  the debt crisis.  Specifically talking about a study that's recently been done, not on employment or income but on the wealth of the average American i.e. wealth measured by a household's assets minus its debts.  And it made me really depressed to listen to all this because not only do I come from a family where our net wealth is probably a negative at this point, but it made me think about my own wealth as a young single with student loans, trying to make it as a musician in the wild and renting from a landlord who, yesterday, did the shittiest job of re-caulking our bathtub that I have ever seen in my 25 years... it was pretty laughable.  Needless to say, my net wealth is also at a negative right now and isn't expected to rise anytime in the near foreseeable future.

And then I made the mistake of picking up today's copy of the New York Times only to further enlighten myself on the impasse taking place in Congress these days.  It was not a smart decision.  I got home to find a stray cat mewing in my rock garden for food and it was almost enough to put me over the edge:  everybody that I knew (myself, my family, the average American being casually discussed and dismissed on public radio, and the cat)... poor, hungry, thirsty, and of course dying from the national crisis.  By 10 am, doom and gloom had already set into my thoughts for the day. 

I should've gone on a run this morning instead.... 

I hear my mom's parting words as I used to board the bus during grade school still echo through my brain, "I love you!  Make good choices!"  Alas... something I'm still learning...

But then I went inside and made my coffee and actually ate something (good job, right Katie?).  And then I decided to change my course for the day:  I picked up my Bible and turned to the Psalms.  The sermon notes inserted made the pages fall open to Psalm 104, a psalm of creation -- one that has been near and dear to me for a long time.  Its words were like balm to my already weary heart, so tired of debt ceiling crises and divorces and break-ups... "The lions roar for their prey and seek their food from God.  The sun rises, and they steal away; they return and lie down in their dens.  Then people go out to their work, to their labor until evening" (Ps 104: 21-23).

When I turned further to Proverbs to pick up where I had last left off in the book (recommended reading by my counselor), I found another measure of consolation:  "Blessed are those who find wisdom (aka the fear of the Lord, from Prov 1:7), those who gain understanding, for she is more profitable than silver and yields better returns than gold.  She is more precious than rubies; nothing you desire can compare with her.  Long life is in her right hand; in her left are riches and honor.  Her ways are pleasant ways, and all her paths are peace.  She is a tree of life to those who take hold of her; those who hold her fast will be blessed" (Prov 3:13-18).

And I don't know about you, but there's something terribly comforting in the rhythm suggested in Psalm 104.  There's a simplicity to it:  an earth created by God, its inhabitants (both animals and humans) dependent upon him for work and survival.  And for those of us with souls, there's more... wisdom, found only in Christ... not in the New York Times, not in public radio syndicates, not in mutual funds or real estate or overseas investments.  But wisdom, the fear of the Lord... yielding more returns than we could ever ask for, benefits to our heart and well-being that money simply cannot buy.

And at this point, I'm not sure what's more amazing to me:  the refreshing power of simplicity and wisdom, or the way it always seems to happen upon me when I most need it...