Perspective // On Lofts and Life

I was feeling a little overwhelmed at the start of last week. Questions about our building work hanging over me. Stage One is pretty much completed now... we're waiting on our carpet and a radiator, but aside from that, our brand new bedroom and bathroom in the loft are good to go. Stage Two has looked a little problematic before its even started, and while the busyness of the day keeps me from dwelling on it too much, at night, the worries simmer up. When your mind is full of taps and tiles and details, and whether the whole thing will even get off the ground at 2am, all perspective seems to go out the window.

Perspective. My old friend.

Because for me, that word will always bring back flashing images of hospital cots, and oxygen tubes and heart echoes. For me, that word perspective will always be shaped like a nine week old baby fighting for her life.

Three years ago, when our baby girl was diagnosed with Kawasaki Disease, fever raging, splotchy red and arteries dilated to four times their normal size, I wondered if I would ever again get stressed by silly things like house extensions.

And in that moment. The penny drops. The realisation hits. God opens my eyes and reminds me of all the goodness and blessing and mercy and grace I experience every day in every moment.

I am so thankful... so very, very thankful, that the biggest things I have to stress about right now are whether our house extension will start this month or next, whether the tiles piled high in our garden should be kept or sold, whether the pipe for the taps will actually physically fit down the back of our sink unit. These things feel like niggling intruders... questions I need to answer, but don't want to deal with. And yet...

I have so much to be thankful for... and yet here I sit, knee deep in worries and questions that I can't actually do anything about anyway!

Perspective. A reason to rejoice. To be thankful. To remember what really matters.

And give my worries and cares to the one who cares for me...

Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving,

present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding,

will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus

- Philippians 4:6-7 -