A Mist

     While I was having my car washed today, Jess began to blow fog on the window.  She loves to draw pictures in it before it disappears.  She started drawing an "M" for me and was getting so frustrated because it disappeared so fast.  She said something that stopped me in my tracks.  She said, "it doesn't stay here for very long!"  I hesitated because on my quest to see and hear God everywhere I felt like He needed me to hear THAT.  I remembered what James 4:14-15 says, "Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow.  What is your life?  You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes.  Instead you ought to say, 'If it is the Lord's will, we will live and do this or that."  
     Even with the best of intentions, I still carry plans, expectations, and worries around with me.  I will allow myself a "bad" day because part of me feels entitled to so many days.  Although this illustration seems kind of morbid, it actually encouraged me.  It reminded me that today is a gift.  The choices I make today matter because I am not promised tomorrow. Living just for today was not overwhelming.  Had I tried to live in tomorrow or next month, I would have had a bad day...a portion of my blob would have disappeared in worrying about things that haven't even happened, in a future I am not guaranteed.  There is a reason I am alive today and I know that God didn't want me to miss that...this is the day the Lord has made.  He is asking me to rejoice in that.  When you think of that mist rapidly evaporating, today becomes a precious gift.
    

Because I am such a visual learner, I took pictures so that I would see and remember.  This all took about five seconds...

I am grateful to God for TODAY.  I am so thankful that days come one at a time!  Thank you, Lord, for reminding me that I am but a mist because it makes today and everyday extremely valuable, extremely worthwhile.

"Here dies another day during which I have had eyes, ears, hands and the great world round me; and with tomorrow begins another.  Why am I allowed two?"

--G.K. Chesterton