The Quiet of the Morning

The house seems very quiet this morning...Emery is off to work, my friend Debbie has gone home after a wonderful visit with her. The birthday party decorations have been removed, all the extra chairs put back in their proper place. Things are tidy and back to normal. The windows are closed, keeping the morning chill at bay, but making the house silent. I hear no cars going by or hear birds singing. If I listen carefully I can hear the rooster crowing in the distance.

The sound of the wood stove door with its squeaking hinges, seems extra loud as I build a small fire. It seems so strange to have a fire going in late April, but I like it. The smell of wood smoke will delight my nose as morning chores are done. Its a smell more dear to me than the finest of perfumes. Its a "home sweet home" kind of smell for me. A reminder that my dreams of so long ago have come true. I never had dreams of a big house, or a fancy car, just for a simple home in the woods, wood stove, growing my own food, and being free to live different from the rat race. I did dream of having at least 13 children though, and perhaps that will be a dream fulfilled with having at least that many grandchildren to love.

Even as a teenager I never felt that things made you anything better than what you were in your deepest sense of being. Things are just that, things. Maybe "stuff" is a bit like those sprinkles you put on cakes. They look pretty but add no taste or substance to what they decorate. We probably all know people, maybe even see it a bit in ourselves at times, that feel better when they can be made to look more this or that by what they own. Hiding a feeling of inferiority behind things they can't afford or stuffing a lonely feeling with new things, feeding a hunger that seems to be like a bottomless pit. Matthew 5:6 Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled. Such a different picture than what is found in Ezekiel 7:19 when the value of possessions are spoken about, "They will throw their silver into the streets, and their gold will be an unclean thing. Their silver and gold will not be able to save them in the day of the LORD's wrath. They will not satisfy their hunger or fill their stomachs with it, for it has made them stumble into sin."

I am not saying that having stuff is bad, it's that we buy them trying to fill a void that is never satisfied with the accumulation of more things. I see this hunger pop up in my life when my spiritual life is in need of being fed proper and not just appeased with spiritual junk food, the fast food variety, the kind that gives you a quick fix of making us feel good about how we live our lives, even when its lacking in producing good spiritual fruit.

The sages through time, have all taught, that what we really want and what we really need is to be content, to live life well with only the basics, anything after that is just extra that we can live without, and what will give us true happiness is a heart full of love and compassion. To love one another and God. To love others as much as you love yourself. This hunger we keep trying to feed by accumulating bigger and better stuff, will only be fed by seeking out the type of food Christ spoke about in Matthew 5: 6

So many parents could give their children what they really need, lots of love and time, if they would show by example that being content with what is needed rather than what is wanted, this is a wealth that cannot be taken from you.