Wearily upward

I was stuck in traffic the other day.   A 12-mile round trip to pick up Madeleine (my daughter), that should have taken 60 minutes, took 2 hours.   It was frustrating to say the least, mainly because it was of my own doing. Traffic seemed pretty bad, so I decided to take a different route.   Big mistake.   Traffic was bad everywhere, so I basically sat in a line of cars on a route which can politely be described as the very long way round . This isn’t the first time I took the long way round to get where I wanted to be because of my own impatience.   Life sometimes gives us all, on different occasions, ‘traffic’ that slows us down, for whatever reason.   This isn’t always a bad thing either. Read Jeremiah 29:4-9.   Jeremiah sends this letter to the exiled Israelites taken away by Nebuchadnezzar.   There were some ‘prophets’ proclaiming that God will bring them back to Israel soon.   God says no, that’s not right.   Plant trees. ...

It really feels like the world's going down the drain; or going to hell in a handbasket as our American friends would very aptly describe it.   Violence, war, conflict, protests, sadness, isolation, genocide, injustice, illness, depression, oppression, hate, cruelty, fear, pain...   The list goes on...   And that's only within the church...   The rest of the world looks even worse. It seems to easy to lose hope in the face of current affairs.   Is there any way we can turn this around?   Are our opinions so vastly different that there is no conceivable way of reconciliation at all?   Is there no way we can ever stand together as human beings again? I'm pretty frustrated at the moment.   People annoy me.   I can totally see myself living on a farm somewhere remote, taking care of animals (sheep, most likely), drinking wine made from grapes of my own vineyard and working hard to provide for my immediate family...   Bliss...  ...