Present in the Present

I'm sitting in a quiet house watching the sun come up in the distance. It's been beautiful shades of purple blended with oranges in perfect ombre fashion. Everyone is still asleep - including the big ball of fluff nestled by my side. He's usually letting all his puppy energy out after a full night of sleep but there's a sense of calm that I'm soaking in.

The sun is starting to glow with a magnificent light. It's brilliance so bright I can no longer stare directly at it. I love my chair that sits beside the double window giving a perfect view of each new sunrise, each new day. 

There were highs and lows yesterday. A special event brought some stressful moments and I wasn't sure if it would be pulled off successfully or not. But that's all in the past. I cannot control or change what has already taken place.

Tomorrow is a looming threat of what's being called the St. Patrick's Eve snow storm. Yes, I did type snow. In Virginia. In the middle of March. (I married a boy from Maine who is used to this - but I can wholeheartedly say my newsfeed reports everyone adamently objecting to this forecast. Including me.) But that's all the future. I cannot control or predict the weather, or anything else that is yet to come.

12When the angel of the Lord appeared to Gideon, he said, “The Lord is with you, mighty warrior.” 13“Pardon me, my lord,” Gideon replied, “but if the Lord is with us, why has all this happened to us? Where are all his wonders that our ancestors told us about when they said, ‘Did not the Lord bring us up out of Egypt?’ But now the Lord has abandoned us and given us into the hand of Midian.”

Judges 6:12-13

Learning to be present in the present. Not worrying about tomorrow. Not rehashing yesterday. Realizing that God's presence is with me in my present. So often I'm looking for wonders and signs - the big miraculous things that I am hoping to come - and I miss His presence in the moment I'm at here and now. Like the sunrise that is now bursting forth with rays breaking through the window and casting such a glare, I can barely see the screen to type. Or the peacefulness of this calm morning while everyone still restfully sleeps. Or the fact that I am alive today, living and breathing, walking and moving. It should be cause for me to pause and ask Him what He has planned for ME - not what I expect from Him. 

I am naturally a planner and big-picture thinker so my mind doesn't just skip ahead, it lunges forward in what seems like a voyage to infinity and beyond... I leave my own present to worry about not just tomorrow, but the next week, month and year. Will there be snow? Will there be school? Do we have enough groceries to get us through? How will this impact the entire week? What about the rest of the school year? 

Just yesterday I sat on the back deck discussing plans for 2015 and worrying about something that isn't even a real scenario yet! I was so caught up in what I am trying to plan that I missed the cool breeze blowing through my hair. I was so wrapped up in what I am trying to figure out that I missed the warmth of the sun heating the day. I was so distracted by something that isn't even a reality at this point that I had lost the enjoyment of our family picnic outside. 

A thousand years in your sight are like a day that has just gone by, or like a watch in the night.

Psalm 90:4

One day is like a thousand years to an Omnipotenti, Omniscient, Omnipresent God. This one brief little flash of a day that I am about to wrecklessly discard of because I'm worried about tomorrow or still lingering in yesterday. If I were to truly realize that this day is so brief and yet so rare and I'm only been given it once, would I stop worrying and planning? 

Casting all my cares on Him and learning to be present in the moment, realizing that life is happening right in front of me. Forgetting what is behind, I can't change that anyway, learning from the past and using it to direct the future, I press on toward the goal - just as scripture tells me to do - but not without realizing that today - right here, right now, in this very moment - I am learning to live in the present.