I don’t come here often enough to remember everything. Even if there are a few changes from time to time, for the briefest of moments, 30 minutes or so, I have to adapt.
Deja vu? I’ve been here before. It feels unfamiliar.
Bigger crowds, faster speeds, along with an unfamiliar vehicle. Arriving at an airport I seldom use, but I’ve been to for 55+ years, and then dealing with road names vaguely familiar.
Familiarity returns.
Of course, flying in at midnight, a long rental car line, and a hotel that takes special driving maneuvers to find. Sleep comes by 3:30 a.m. and then up by 9:15 a.m. Whew. Nearly 6 hours. I must be okay. I spend the daytime hours on the go. No slowing down. Much to get done.
The headline news is strange.
The Astros lost, and the Rangers won.
The Chargers lost, and the Cowboys won.
Does any of it really matter?
It’s been just a few months shy of living away from Houston for 30 years. 30 years.
And this thought hit me.
Given time, we become unfamiliar with what was once familiar.
What’s that old adage about bikes? You never forget how to ride?
When I was “learning” to drive, Mom would toss me the keys. “Let’s go.” For several hours, I could go wherever I wanted. That’s when I learned freeway driving, putting map knowledge to use, and getting in and around downtown. Somewhere around midnight, we’d come dragging home. It’s time to sleep. School/work comes early.
Since those early years, I figure I’ve driven over two million miles. Most of them are away from Houston and Harris County. Across the nation, other continents, between Texas and Alaska a number of times, for work, pleasure, and why on earth not… We are living in times when we expect the road to be open, and I’ve enjoyed it. That’s changing rapidly. It’s getting very expensive to take a proverbial “Sunday Drive.”
What we are familiar with now
will disappear as the rules of life change.
This brings me to the thought that’s been banging around my mind for the past dozen hours or so.
There is much of life we don’t want to do, so we don’t, and that familiar place and space of time melds into the background of our mind. Throw us back into it, and we know we’ve done it before and wonder why it feels so strange.
I’m at a hotel, and it was just a few years ago that the pandemic interrupted our normal life, and as we return, what was normal in 2019 feels strange. Unfamiliar. Yet hauntingly strange, we know we’ve done this before.
I’m concerned about those who have not returned to normal. Can they not retreat from that strange, discombobulated world of abnormal and return?
Through the years, I’ve chatted with those who no longer live a spiritual life. When you ask about certain pieces of their past, they look confused and shrug their shoulders, “I was just faking it. I didn’t really feel it.” Or “I don’t remember.”
This is where consistency comes into play. It’s not the familiar style of the church from our youth but the relationship with God that makes His Word and Spirit familiar to me every day of the year.
Generations of lives have walked away. But God is still the same, even when our style has changed.
I’m just saying I don’t want to become unfamiliar with my Lord when I walk into His Presence. I don’t want to feel lost and confused. Just as I felt when I arrived here early Monday morning. For about 30 minutes, Houston felt strange, and then I settled into my new/old world.
I can do this.
Psalms 42:4 NKJV
When I remember these things,
I pour out my soul within me.
For I used to go with the multitude;
I went with them to the house of God,
With the voice of joy and praise,
With a multitude that kept a pilgrim feast.
Psalms 63:1-8 NKJV
A Psalm of David When He Was in the Wilderness of Judah.
O God, You are my God;
Early will I seek You;
My soul thirsts for You;
My flesh longs for You
In a dry and thirsty land
Where there is no water.
So I have looked for You in the sanctuary,
To see Your power and Your glory.
Because Your lovingkindness is better than life,
My lips shall praise You.
Thus I will bless You while I live;
I will lift up my hands in Your name.
My soul shall be satisfied as with marrow and fatness,
And my mouth shall praise You with joyful lips.
When I remember You on my bed,
I meditate on You in the night watches.
Because You have been my help,
Therefore in the shadow of Your wings I will rejoice.
My soul follows close behind You;
Your right hand upholds me.
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