The Twin Towers

The story was told in church this morning of how the Twin Towers used to be the first sign that ships' captains saw as they approached New York. They provided direction which was comforting (though scarcely necessary in these days of plentiful navigational instruments and charts). Now, the towers are no more and that man-built source of security is forever gone.

Maybe I’m stretching the analogy a bit but somehow that seems a picture of my life and it provides me with a hard-to-learn lesson. Very few things in this world can provide a true sense of security, certainly not those things that are man-made. Wealth, possessions, family, friends, health, etc, etc – all can be gone in the blink of an eye (just ask Job of Biblical fame). The only things that can’t be taken away are those things I carry inside me that endure regardless of circumstances.

So, I wrestle with the Christian message of a God who is love, yet whose presence I rarely feel – and I struggle somehow to connect with the sense of hope that would allow me to say with Job “though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him” (Job 13:15, KJV). All the time knowing that the answer is simply to “cease striving and know that I am God” (Psalm 46:10a, NASB).

Poor neglected blog .... again ....

Once again it's been ages since I've posted anything here. This time I have what I consider to be a good excuse - in the last six weeks I have gone from vaguely thinking that it's time I moved house to somewhere less isolated (ie which doesn't require a 30 minute drive to get to any social contact I'm interested in), all the way to having signed a contract on a house elsewhere, packed a whole heap of stuff and being set to move in about three weeks time. It's been quite a journey for both me and my parents starting with the day when one of us mooted the idea that it might be better if we were geographically closer.

So now I'm tired from packing, both excited and apprehensive about moving and nervous about trying to sell this place - believe me when I say moving house and chronic fatigue syndrome do not go well together. Thus today is a rest day, when apart from a few necessary chores I have allowed myself to "waste" time surfing the Net, watching television, etc - this is distinct from those days when such activities provide necessary breaks between packing boxes, cleaning rooms or organising the myriad of things involved with a move.

Unfortunately one of the first casualties of all this extra activity has been my Physics studies which haven't been looked at for over a month. I had almost finished the first half of the course and was just getting set to register to sit the exam in November when all this started - now I am very grateful I don't have to be trying to study for an exam on top of everything else. But the physics books have not yet been packed and will be taken up to the new place in my car so they are readily accessible once I'm feeling up to it again.