What's in a Name?

Ecstasy (n)- 2. Excessive joy; rapture; a degree of delight that arrests the whole mind; joy may rise to ecstasy. (Websters 1828 Dictionary)
Doldrums (n)- A sate of inactivity or stagnation.(Dictionary.com)

Friday, April 18, 2008

Looking Backward and Froward

The next time someone asks me what I do I am going to tell them that I run a lady bug extermination camp. I'm serious!! My little corner of the room, where my bed is, must have a huge, invisible-to-the-human-eye sign that says "All Lady Bugs in Maine, Come Hither." I have to vacuum every day and I suck up tons and tons of them. This evening I spent ten minutes getting everyone that I could find around my bed and window. It looked like the coast was clear! I smiled the sweet smile of victory, returned the vacuum to it's special, handy dandy spot only to return to find six more lady bugs. It's as if they were saying, "HAHAHA! You will never win! We will ALWAYS return!!!" I gave a loud cry of despair and prepared for another night in the company of the little orange and black warriors. One night I woke up to find one behind my ear! Not pleasant. I have probably swallowed some in my sleep, but hey, as long as I don't know about it, I don't care. I wonder what the protein content in lady bugs is....... anyway. On to a more interesting subject.

Last year our church had it's first annual family camp at Dunn's Campground. It was such a blessing in many ways. It was also a growing experience for me. I came face to face with my selfishness and pride, which was humbling, but so very needed. We also became tightly knit as a church and have stayed that way.
Looking back on camp last year makes me look forward to it this year. It's a little over a month away and we will be there. Playing volleyball, being competitive(we have some really competitive people in our fellowship), memorizing scriptures, listening to Biblical teaching, enjoying the sounds of the lake in the early morning, rowing out in the middle to do devotions, escaping from the world of fast paced electronics and hyper images and experiencing the sweet fellowship that only people who know Jesus can.
I tend to forget how important it is to be still and think about these precious memories and the lessons learned from them. I want to be filled with the peace of God and not worry so much about missing things, but just let Him bring them to me and respond in the way that Jesus would- with gratefulness and contentment.
For the next week I get to stay with my cousins Renee and Kristy while my Aunt Angie and Uncle Rob go on a cruise to tropical paradise. I've been looking forward to this as well. Parts of me are always afraid to look forward to things, because sometimes they don't turn out as well as I anticipated them turning out. But as Anne Shirley would say, getting excited about things is half the fun of it! So I will expect good things and be thankful regardless of what happens. Because God is good.
I won't be posting anything for the next week, so that's why I have posted so often the past couple of days. I hope that you all have a great week- vacation for some, trips for some (I'm looking forward to pictures Ali!!) and just the normal grind for others. Whatever you are doing and wherever you are, may God bless you!

1 comment:

Laura said...

Once I was at camp and there were ladybugs in the cabin, and one of my friends managed to convince another one of my friends that the ladybugs were going to crawl in her ears and multiply....

Yeah. She was 'jokingly' afraid of ladybugs for like 2 years after that, it made for a great inside joke ;)

And don't feel alone, my house is also a breeding grounds for ladybugs and the vacuum comes into play more than once in this season!