Eyes wide open

*This post was inspired by probably the most beautiful book I've ever read, Ann Voskamp’s One Thousand Gifts, which I just finished reading*

Today, I wake smiling. The sweet chirping of birds drifts through my window, I read a chapter of Lord of the Rings while I eat the parfait-and-toast breakfast my sweet momma prepared for me,  I plant little pink Impatiens, cool brown earth on my fingers, and wind through my hair. I wear my favorite shirt, look forward to a weekend up north with family….Today, joy is easy to find, always waiting for me.

Today, I want to live long. I write Bucket Lists, laid carefully on my desk. Ride a gondola in Venice, see the Eifel Tower…there is so much I want to do, so many things to see.

Today, I get to live.

Isn’t that enough to inspire joy in me?

Yet ever the  daily struggle of Now, not often as joy-filled as today….Now where I can’t see beauty, only unfinished schoolwork, high school drama, petty conflicts….and too often I wake frowning, dreading the day to come. Now where mommas in Africa watch their babies starve to death, where little children are abused, where fathers with many mouths to feed die from cancer. Now where often, all I can see is life’s disappointments.

In Philippians 4:11-12, Paul writes, “I have learned how to be content with whatever I have. I know how to live on almost nothing or with everything.  I have learned the secret of living in every situation, whether it is with a full stomach or empty, with plenty or little.” Joy is not just something we find on good days. Joy, thankfulness, must be learned, practiced, daily, in the good and the bad, in the disappointments.

Here dies another day
During which I have had eyes, ears, hands
And the great world round me;
And with tomorrow begins another.
Why am I allowed two?
~GK Chesterton

This living, this is grace. Why do I feel I must see the splendor of Venice and Paris to fully grasp the world’s magnificence? His grace is here, now, in little pink Impatients and a momma humbly serving. In receiving another day to live! I am still learning to recognize grace, to feel joy, on days without flowers and favorite shirts. On days of clouds and arguments and stress. He is always God, and isn’t His grace also evident in chances of new mercies and the healing of brokenness?

All is grace. Praying without ceasing is praying with eyes wide open, looking for this grace, thanking Him for it. Won't you join me, with eyes open wide?