Home Improvement- Chapter 2

Chapter 2- Hurricane Protection

"And I applied my heart to know wisdom and to know madness and folly.  I perceived that this also is but a striving for the wind."  Eccl 1:17.

So I am sitting at the Village Inn last night with a couple guys that I meet with and just talk about life and throw out biblically based challenges to one another.  Now I'm really digging my scrumptious cherry supreme pie on Free Pie Day at the Viking Village Inn (that goes out to you C brotha), and I get this yearning for more to eat.  So I order the cheese omlette, the hash browns and some really greasy bacon to top it all off.  In order not to feel guilty that I am eating too much, I look at C and ask him to order what he wants as the fourth item.

We talked for close to an hour about all the things going on in our lives lately and how the last challenge went for all of us.  Grace was the topic.  Yah, exactly.  We didn't quite hit even par on that one.  All kidding aside, we really did work hard on giving grace and working on turning that other cheek, but as human as we are, that's like trying to hold in a burp after drinking a 2-liter of soda sometimes.

So as C and H are talking, I pull out my bible and go back through the first chapter of Ecclesiastes I had read the night before.  I remember reading about Solomon's loathing over all he had worked so hard to gather and accomplish and how it was like "striving after the wind."  I really started thinking from the shoes of the second smartest man who ever walked the face of this earth.  He had it all, including some astronomical number of wives, boundless amounts of money: the Bill Gates or Warren Buffett of that time.  It just struck me that despite the fact this man had everything in the world, including the biggest, wisest brain, he sat down and wrote a book about how vane his life was. 

Then I threw it out there like a poker ante on green felt: "What wind are we chasing after in life?" 

What's the one thing, whether now, in the past, or in the future, we are chasing, have chased or could possibly chase, which would be like trying to grasp at the wind in a hurricane?  What do we do about stopping the "madness" and re-focusing on those things which are most important?  What do we need to do now that will stop the frantic, swirling chase and help us find the eye of our hurricane, the calm amidst the storm?  Lastly, what are those "things that are most important?" 

Here's my challenge to you all:  find your wind and enjoy life as it whips about you but doesn't knock you down and instill fear in you.  Is it time to cut back on work hours and spend an extra hour at home with your kids?  Is time to settle down and stop chasing after your favorite TV show while your spouse tries to talk with you about life?  Is it time to devote the bar hours at night to digging into the Word and finding solice in scripture and the God who loves you, instead of at the bottom of the bottle? 

Where's your storm?  Figure that out, and then chase after the eye of the storm.  I guarantee God will be at the center of your storm, pushing out the wall and providing solice in a place which is typically brimming with "madness."

Calling on THE Weatherman,
Freak