Sunday Morning Meds--Restoration*

“He restores my soul” Psalm 23:3

My wife claims she inadvertently got some laughs a week or so ago, when, at a Bible study on Revelation, she told the faithful, in all honesty, that when she thought of heaven, she imagined a lakeside cabin in northern Minnesota—preferably not in January.

I know exactly why she said that.

A friend of mine told me a week ago about his daughter, who lives all the way across the state. She and her family have had more than their share of problems—a child with a chronic illness, some long-term unemployment, some scrambling for jobs. This daughter, carting her kids to school one day, called her dad from the shoulder of a freeway, frantic. The van had simply died. My friend is a mechanic, but he was also 300 miles away.

I could never have guessed how much time and energy parents expend worrying about adult kids, probably because, even as twenty-somethings, we’re all pretty much oblivious to how much worry we can generate ourselves—or at least I was. Our children have also run into their share of problems—unemployment, physical and emotional strain, scrambling for jobs. And we worry. Good night, do we worry.

Meanwhile, to say the least, we’re busy with our own lives—jobs, responsibilities. I’m a church elder; don’t ask me if I’m keeping up. I’m on the road too often, and I’ve always got student papers to read, papers that I should have handed back sometime last week.

I really should visit my mother more often—she’s alone—but she’s 500 miles away. My wife’s parents aren’t well. Like many others, my wife and I often feel as sandwiched as cheap cheese and salami.

For the first time in thirty years, my wife and I took a bit of a mid-year vacation and slipped silently away to a rented cabin in Minnesota, spent five days—we’re not talking summer vacation here—in a north woods resplendent in fall colors. The weather was perfect, the leisure was divine (forgive me for using that word).

I was—we were—restored.

For believers, Psalm 23, I’m convinced, is about maintenance. Shepherd that he is, my Lord leads me beside still waters, he makes me lie down, he takes care of me.

Television and politics lie—life itself is not easy. Endless tasks have to be done, and far too often we stub our toes and get paper cuts. We start sagging and parts of us fall out. My back hurts every morning. Bladders weaken. It ain’t pretty.

But God gives us these glorious cabin-in-Minnesota moments. He restores us, inside and out. The Lord God almighty blesses us with a cupped hand that holds our lives better than any fancy executive chair. He restores our very soul.

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from Sixty at Sixty.