unexpected rest

I love getting to work early.

I love sitting in the stillness of the house, listening to the clocks tick. Today I sat on the couch and watched the snow fall on the back deck. It was the first snow of the year.

I walked from the train station down neighborhood streets listening to "Come Thou Long Expected Savior," overwhelmed with longing for the return of the Lord. There are moments in this life when it's almost unbearable. Suddenly and deeply you are gripped with that longing to know the world whole and healed. It's during this season--one of felt "expectation" and "anticipation"--that I am soberly aware of this unsettled longing. This isn't the place where my soul is at rest. No, there is a place and a time to come...and the waiting is almost impossible.

In simple moments, like sitting watching the snowflakes land, there is remarkable rest. it happens so suddenly and unexpectedly. "Unsettled" as I sometimes am in expectation of the Lord, He is gracious to grant glimpses of that glorious rest--to provide pieces of an eternal stillness that we crave in this fast-paced space. Maybe these are the "sign-posts" that C.S. Lewis writes about in Surprised By Joy--you know, the ones that point us upward and onward, for we are only passing through.

Today I was so thankful for a beautiful snow, a warm scarf, a hot cup of tea, and a cozy place to go home to. Don't let us take these things for granted, Lord. We are grateful in our plenty--keep us so.