It would make a wierd movie.

When I read the Bible, my mind creates visuals.  I'm made that way.  So my mind is creating the strangest video ever.  My reading today was Jeremiah 40 through 45.  Why so many?  I couldn't stop: such a story!  So now I have this 'Book of Eli meets Taliban' thing in my head.  They did eventually catch and kill Ishmael before he could get back to his country.  Jeremiah was dragged off to Egypt while he kept saying "Don't go there."  Poor Baruch lost everything, but God said "Don't pursue stuff, this isn't the time for it and I will protect you."  Jeremiah was protected, but went through unimaginable stuff while he was being protected.  He didn't seem very affected by it.
 Call it diversion, or maybe strange, but I am seeing way too much.  Makes me want to be sure I'm on God's side in all this stuff of my life.
Today, my neighbor awaits her husband's funeral.  We went to see her between downpours yesterday.  I bought her this braided azalea with large white blooms.  I found one with a good number of blossoms fully open and a good number of buds yet to bloom.  She said she'd never seen one like that.  The braid was fully integrated about 2/3 the way and had a spacer at the top to hold them apart.  She can plant it as a memorial to her lifemate.  I was pleased that she was pleased.  He was a good and godly man who loved to preach and loved to sing.  He was a wood carver delux before he developed Alzheimer's.  The past few years have been difficult for her.  There is a combined sence of relief and sorrow.
Last week, some of my friends were affected horribly by the rains.  My heart breaks for them and now we have more.  The cleanup was not even finished and now there is more.  I ask for mercy and protection from this round of the deluge.  They are good people of faith who have looked for the humor in it and have been shown love and help.
Today is a milesmarker for a family member.  My heart is both extremely concerned and at peace.  That may sound like a contradiction, but really it's not.  I know God is about redemption and restoration, but how long?  I know truth is the right path, but how much hurt will be endured at it's out flow?  I know we will be healed, but who will reject God's powerful hand.  Don't tell me we cannot reject God's hand.  I am reading Jeremiah!  I know who wins in the end. I will continue to ask for grace and mercy.  I will call for redemption and restoration.  I will yell and cry a little and then say "You are God; your will be done."
One of my girls is walking through a valley and growing from the experience daily.  I see it in many ways.  Once she was a slave to darkness and God told me flat out during one of my screaming, crying, pleading sessions that it was done, that she was redeemed.  Many years and tears later, the redemption came and the growth started.  Birth and growth are messy - sometimes hilarious, sometimes humiliating, sometimes devastating - processes.
One of my girls is walking through a shakey terrain.  Which direction will the mountain fall.  Will her feet slip in the bog?  Are there unseen predators lurking?  There is so much to go through before the ground is solid.
I stand and cry "Heal us O LORD and we shall be healed."  I care so much.  I know I have much to do that would hold my efforts and thoughts, but I am scattered and pieced out right now.  In transition from one job to another, my mind is once more captured by my direct and extended family and I find I am once more in prayer.  "This I know: that You, O LORD, are loving and You, O LORD are just."  Righteousness and peace have kissed.  It was called crucifiction and it was no easy thing for Jesus or his Father to go through.  Yet it was the only way to have both mercy and justice and it lives on for those who believe.  I believe, LORD, help my unbelief.