Winter Musings

With winter comes weather that sometimes forces us to stay in, or to adopt a much more cautious approach to moving about. When snow and ice start to make their appearance, I want to be safer in moving around. Many never seem to learn that a little less speed makes such travel a lot safer. We lived in the southern tier of New York for over a decade, and it never failed to amaze me that people who lived in the area their entire lives forgot from one year to the next how to drive on snow and ice.

Yet isn't that also true of the way we approach difficult times in our lives? We have a bad experience, and think we have learned our lesson. But another similiar occasion arises, and we may very well react as badly as we did the last time, as if we hadn't been through it before.

My wife recently sent me a post that spoke of our need to take responsibility for our choices, because we cannot control what happens around us. I reflected on that for a good bit, mulling it over in relation to my own life. I had to reluctantly agree that I needed to understand I couldn't control other people, but I can control my choices in responding to them. I choose not to respond as a victim, but to continue to do the best I can to guide them in the directions that will bring the success and growth they desire. That's the calling I have - to shepherd a people toward the kind of life I believe God would have them live. I can show them refreshment, shelter, and offer love - what each chooses to do with that offering is up to them. All I am required to do is continue to following the calling.

What a challenge! It isn't easy! It is far easier in today's culture to look for the culprit for our difficulties, but we need to recall the Pogo cartoon where that wonderfully articulate muskrat announced sagely, "We has met the enemy, and he is us!"

Peace!