when you're out of step ...

While we were on vacation in Dennisport I spent some time watching sandpipers on the beach. They ran into and out of the waves as they were searching for a bit of food buried under the sand. They shared their beach with several ducks and sandcastle "architects." It didn't seem to matter to them that we were loitering about their home; they just kept doing lunch.

Unless you've been fully off the grid for the last few weeks, it's hard to escape noticing that the debate over health care has become heated with lots of misinformation from both sides of the issue. When you listen, you can't help but hear a lot of fear and frustration bubbling to the top. So much of the public debate has become rude that I wonder if anyone is listening anymore. Sometimes you feel like you've landed in a country where being gentle is considered a sign of weakness. Jesus didn't think so "... learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart and you will find rest for your souls." Matthew 11:29

As I've watched the process, I am reminded of a group of people who were exiled from their homes and were struggling with how to live in a strange land where they could no longer sing the songs of Zion. The prophet Jeremiah gave them this word from the Lord ... This is what the LORD Almighty, the God of Israel, says to all those I carried into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon: "Build houses and settle down; plant gardens and eat what they produce. Marry and have sons and daughters; find wives for your sons and give your daughters in marriage, so that they too may have sons and daughters. Increase in number there; do not decrease. Also, seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile. Pray to the LORD for it, because if it prospers, you too will prosper." (Jeremiah 29:4-7)

God calls us to pray for the peace and prosperity of our nation even when it isn't feeling like home. He calls us to be about living, to be productive and to seek His blessing for the nation, especially when the politics and policies aren't your first choice. I suspect if we prayed with the same intensity that the town hall meetings have demonstrated, we'd see revival fall. Let's bring the passion into the prayer closet and see what God can do. As the old song says ... His eye is on the sandpiper, and I know He watches me.

Keep the faith