Life « Hilary Barnett

Posts Tagged 'Life'

Seasons Change.

dirtroad4 The leaves here in Nashville have gone from subtle shades of brown to bright bursts of red and orange. Being in this city in the fall is one gorgeous experience. Fall is one of my favorite seasons. The crispness in the air, the glorious changing foliage, and the knowledge of the coming winter makes me want to be outside every minute.

It’s interesting to see how the new seasons bring changes in life. No matter how “stuck” I’ve felt in the past, I am starting to realize that nothing ever stays the same for long. This year has brought many changes in not only my outside circumstances, but in me as a person. It’s those everyday experiences, relationships and decisions that have shaped and changed me so much this year. It’s easy to say “I quit my job”, or “I’m back in school”, or, “we’re trying to start a family”, but it’s hard to put into words all the things that I have learned about myself, and the complex and important things that have happened in my marriage, my friendships, and my walk with God. Those types of things are too deep to explain.

As I look back at this year, and look forward to the Christmas season and the ringing in of 2010, there are many things I am grateful for, and many things I am still clueless about. I guess if my experiences this year have taught me anything, it’s to savor every single day for what it is, and don’t just go through the motions. We make our lives what we want them to be, through our small little daily activities- what we eat, how we spend our money, the people we spend time with, the work that we do, the creative endeavors to which we give ourselves.

I work with an older woman, helping her to organize her house and her stuff. One thing that I love about working with older people is that you get a sense of perspective. They have lived life, and seen more than you could ever imagine. One day we were going through her upstairs storage, and we found several boxes of the trips she had taken, with pictures and memorabilia. We had lugged most everything upstairs to the attic at that point, and I went to grab the boxes to take them up. She stopped me and said, “no, leave those down here- I like to look at them from time to time.”

Her husband had done quite well for himself, and I don’t think that she had to want for much throughout her life. In their younger years, she and her husband were part of the Nashville elite. One day I mentioned, “so you were pretty high society, huh? Must have been fun.” She looked me dead in the eyes and said “it was not fun at all.” I realized that no matter what earthly possessions she had, or what social circles she ran in, nothing was more important to her now than the people in her life and the moments she created with them. I’m grateful to have gained that perspective this year, and I hope that I can live into that knowledge every day.

Many blessings to you as your seasons change!

Being Refined Hurts.

Published October 16, 2009 Christianese , Inspiration , Life , Spirituality 2 Comments
Tags: Christianity, Jesus, Life, Spirituality

57604_resized_refining_gold It’s been a sort of a rough month just figuring out life as I should be living it right now, and I read this devotion in Streams in the Desert, which I am receiving daily in my inbox. This just really spoke to me, exactly where I am right now. I hope it encourages you as it has me.

He Refines Them

“God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world” (Gal. 6:14).

They were living to themselves; self with its hopes, and promises and dreams, still had hold of them; but the Lord began to fulfill their prayers. They had asked for contrition, and had surrendered for it to be given them at any cost, and He sent them sorrow; they had asked for purity, and He sent them thrilling anguish; they had asked to be meek, and He had broken their hearts; they had asked to be dead to the world, and He slew all their living hopes; they had asked to be made like unto Him, and He placed them in the furnace, sitting by “as a refiner and purifier of silver,” until they should reflect His image; they had asked to lay hold of His cross, and when He had reached it to them it lacerated their hands.

They had asked they knew not what, nor how, but He had taken them at their word, and granted them all their petitions. They were hardly willing to follow Him so far, or to draw so nigh to Him. They had upon them an awe and fear, as Jacob at Bethel, or Eliphaz in the night visions, or as the apostles when they thought that they had seen a spirit, and knew not that it was Jesus. They could almost pray Him to depart from them, or to hide His awfulness. They found it easier to obey than to suffer, to do than to give up, to bear the cross than to hang upon it. But they cannot go back, for they have come too near the unseen cross, and its virtues have pierced too deeply within them. He is fulfilling to them His promise, “And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me” (John 12:32).

But now at last their turn has come. Before, they had only heard of the mystery, but now they feel it. He has fastened on them His look of love, as He did on Mary and Peter, and they can but choose to follow. Little by little, from time to time, by flitting gleams, the mystery of His cross shines out upon them. They behold Him lifted up, they gaze on the glory which rays from the wounds of His holy passion; and as they gaze they advance, and are changed into His likeness, and His name shines out through them, for He dwells in them. They live alone with Him above, in unspeakable fellowship; willing to lack what others own (and what they might have had), and to be unlike all, so that they are only like Him. Such, are they in all ages, “who follow the Lamb whithersoever he goeth.”

Had they chosen for themselves, or their friends chosen for them, they would have chosen otherwise. They would have been brighter here, but less glorious in His Kingdom. They would have had Lot’s portion, not Abraham’s. If they had halted anywhere–if God had taken off His hand and let them stray back–what would they not have lost? What forfeits in the resurrection? But He stayed them up, even against themselves. Many a time their foot had well nigh slipped; but He in mercy held them up. Now, even in this life, they know that all He did was done well. It was good to suffer here, that they might reign hereafter; to bear the cross below, for they shall wear the crown above; and that not their will but His was done on them and in them. –Anonymous.

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