Just a Little Bit of Snow

I've felt like the Christmas season ended prematurely, 

and now I realize that it wasn't Christmas cut short, but winter! 

The weather's been so sunny and comparatively warm, it seemed like winter got skipped right over.

Finally, finally, today we got snow flurries all day.

No heavy snow, just a light dusting and the feeling 

that this is how its supposed to be all day. 

This morning after my sunroom time 

(prayer, scripture study, journaling and reading from a soul-stretching, uplifting book),

I bundled up and sat on the porch where I was protected from snow falling on me

and did the NYT mini crossword, Wordle and Connections. Also swiping through Instagram.

It's a very restorative routine. One that's impossible until you're kids are older.

It's lovely.

My "sunroom book" currently is

All Things New: Rethinking Sin, Salvation and Everything In Between

by Fiona and Terryl Givens.

I've always seen God as a loving father. Perhaps because that's who my dad was.

But even so, as someone who is trying to shed perfectionism, I've also been trying to reframe my understanding my relationship with God and that I don't have to earn his love.

It is there, always and forever, and precedes any action on my part.

This passage particularly resonated with me.

"We believe it is a slander against God to presume that 

Their compassion is measured to our merit. 

The story of the prodigal son tells us otherwise...

We are all prodigals, we have all wandered and

we all fall short of our potential without exception. 

And yet, as David Bentley Hart writes,

"...somewhere in the history of every soul 

there are moments when a better way was missed by mischance, 

or by malign interventions from without,

or by disorders of the mind within,

rather than by intentional perversity on the soul's own part."

Our Heavenly Parents are more generous with us than we are with ourselves 

because They are wiser than we are.

This is why we might best understand mercy not as turning a blind eye to our actions 

but as seeing them with a fully understanding eye.

...The love that envelops us is not based on our worthiness. 

It is not our merit that brings it forth.

This love, unsolicited, is the miracle that tells us 

we have a permanent and cherished place in the universe.

***

What better understanding of God's love than to consider it with respect 

to how much we love our children?

(And I assume God doesn't get tired or hungry, stressed out or distracted!)

Nick got a muscle stimulator kit for his (early) birthday.

(I told him he should wrap it up on his birthday and reopen it, 

but he laughed and said he was good not doing that.)

He and Chris were very entertaining this afternoon trying out 

the stimulus and different levels and on different places.

They call it their electric shock therapy. 😂

I made soup for dinner... and wait for it... 

bread.

It doesn't look the greatest, but it tasted the greatest!