I gently reached down and touched her chapped hands. Tenderly they rested on the pew in front of us as we chorused our way through five verses of “We Three Kings.” Her hands have grown over the years, no longer balled into tiny fists; no longer reaching outward to explore a rattler or a peg board. Time has shaped her hands in accordance with the calendar, but I will always recognize them. No matter the weathering that life may bring to them, my daughter’s hands are forever burned into memory. As I stood alongside my Amelia and bravely sang the stanzas, I pondered this heart truth from my friend, Alicia:
This is“main” (Anonymous, pp. 18 – 21). “Main is not behind us. Nor is main way out ahead of us.” (Anonymous, p. 21) Yes! This is the moment I’ve been waiting for. Not tomorrow’s soon-to-be; not yesterday’s once-was. No, those moments aren’t here for me to hold. This one is. This is main. And this is enough.
I spent a lot of my earlier years striving for the main of my tomorrows. It would be easy for me to conclude (in these my latter years) that main has already been . . . that at forty-six, I’ve had my main moments. The rest of them, what’s left? Perhaps the crumbs or the last scrape of batter from the cake bowl. That’s what the world would have me to believe, the enemy as well. But God’s belief system takes a grand departure from the ordinary. God has something more to say about my main.
“I tell you, now is the time of God’s favor, now is the day of salvation.” (2 Cor. 6:2)
Now. Not yesterday; not tomorrow. Now salvation. Now deliverance. Now preservation. Now safety.
Now . . . Jesus.
There’s no greater main than Jesus. Hold him—touch his weathered hands while chorusing his weathered journey—and all moments become sacredly main.
Less looking back at a past hard to remember. Less staring into a future not easily predicted. Instead, more . . . beautifully more, gazing into the moment right in front of me. In a pew; at the kitchen sink; sitting in traffic; under the covers; while conversing with a good book, a good friend, even with a blank computer screen. Wherever I am and whatever my hands find to do, these are all main because God is there with me. To delight in him and with him, even in the seemingly mundane, makes all of life a grand and glorious celebration. I’m not there yet, but I’m not far from taking hold of it.
“Glorious now behold Him arise,
King and God and Sacrifice;
Alleluia, Alleluia!
Earth to heaven replies.
O star of wonder, star of night,
Star with royal beauty bright;
Westward leading, still proceeding,
Guide us to thy perfect light.”
His star still leads me, and the earthly in me still cries out to the heavenly in him . . .
“Guide me, precious Jesus, to your perfect light.”
Today is main, no matter the moments in front of us, friends. Receive them sacredly, grasp them tenderly, and protect them fiercely. God’s light shines in them all. As always . . .
Peace for the journey,
PS: Today I have the privilege of making available to one of you, the audio version of Anonymous: Jesus’ Hidden Years and Yours by Alicia Chole. Leave a comment today, sharing with me about living your main in the mundane. Where have you found Jesus today? I’ll draw a winner with my next post. Shalom.