These past months I have done a lot of driving, and while Heidi works on communications, I think about, contemplate, ponder and wonder about many things. God, theology, history, philosophy, astronomy, etc. I think about the billions of beings I am driving past which together make a forest. I think about the to-me-countless cells making up the trees and ferns and fungi, each one a miraculous, extremely complex, living machine. But God knows and sustains each one, even down to the subatomic particles that make up the atoms, that make up the molecules, that make up the organelles, that make up the cells, that make up the tissues, that make up the organs, that make up the beings, that make up the forests that bless us with beauty and food and oxygen and so much more.

Then I make a list of all the words in English that end with the sound we usually write “sh”. I came up with 69 one-syllable words. Strangely, quite a few of them seem sort of violent or negative: bash, brash, dash (to pieces), gash, lash, mash, gnash, rash, smash, slash, trash, thrash, slosh, slush, smoosh, flush, crush, and blush. Isn’t that strange?

Then I wrestle with angry thoughts, judgmental thoughts, perplexed thoughts. Why do people–including me–do this? Why do people–including me–do that? “If we have food and raiment, let us be content with that.” But people spend their lives, their energies, their time to accumulate more and get more. And then there are those who out of the discontent become malicious, and destroy what other people have worked for, and public infrastructure that makes life so much easier for everyone–such as metro stations, bus stops, traffic lights.

Then I think about how “blessed” we are. For a lot of us, just a couple of generations ago, we didn’t have running water. Our ancestors–well some of them–had the blessing of a well that they could draw water from, others had to go to a creek and carry water a bucket at a time back to the home. A lot of people in some parts of the world still have to do that. And many of them are thankful that there is water for them to go fetch–because sometimes there isn’t any.

Come Thou long-expected Jesus! Come our King! Thy Kingdom come! Thy will be done on Earth as it is done in Heaven!