An answered prayer

I am having a wonderful Bible reading month.

I have been getting such joy and help from everything I am been reading.

Of course, it's not normally like that.  My parent's instilled in me the wonderful habit of reading the Bible before bed, and so it's something that I don't struggle to do.  But I struggle sometimes to concentrate.  I struggle sometimes to learn.  I struggle sometimes to remember what I read the day before.  I do it, because i know it is good for me, and because I know God's word is powerful and I need it in my life.  But I don't always do it because I enjoy it.

I encourage our teenagers at church to read the Bible every day but they struggle with it.   It just doesn't hold the same addictive power as Vampires, or Angels or other super-nature teenagers and their complicated life-styles!  And I understand that.  I actually made a new rule this year- read my Bible before I read fiction.  Because I would read fiction until I was sleepy and then...oh wait, Bible.

But I think i need to keep reminding them and myself that it is a process.  That you do go through periods where it just seems boring and hard to understand, and that is just because of who we are, sinners who don't realise what we have.  That doesn't mean you give up or stop- good things sometimes take hard work.  You persevere, and you ask God to change you and help you, and to mercifully help you to enjoy what is such a special and magical thing.

And you expect that sometimes it will be hard.

But you can also expect that sometimes it will be a joy.  And at those times you need to just ride the wave and read like crazy :)
Love B

An important purchasing decision

I have a few minutes spare and so I walk into the newagent.  I have a really important purchase coming up, and I want to make sure I have put thought into it before I buy.

I love newsagents.  I am not someone who likes spending money, but if I was, I would spend it on stationary.  I still remember the joy of my first "proper job"- and being shown the stationary cupboard and being told "take whatever you need".  Pens, texta's, pretty paper, highlighters.  It's a magical world.

But I'm not here for pens.

I walk through rows of notebooks.  A5 of course.  A5 is perfect because it's portable.  And this purchase must be portable.

But they are plain, boring, and very ordinary.  And very ordinary is fine for my work notebook.  But not for this.

A lady directs me to the "pretty section", and I begin to smile.  So many lovely ones.  I eye the leather ones jealously.  They look so "authorey" but they are expensive, and usually don't have lines I like.

There is a beautiful blue shiny one with glitter and ocean-shades.  I open it up, only to realise it's not ring bound.  It must be ring bound.  I need to be able to flip over the page, so that wherever I am, I can prop up a knee, and write

I open another one.  It is a bit plain, but still pretty.  But the lines are too widely spaced.

I sigh as I look.  When I'm shopping for clothes, usually after a few minutes of flicking up a few tags to look at prices, and running my hands along a row of hangers- I realise, today is not a day where I have patients for shopping.  Today is similar.  I'm just not ready.  This is an important purchase- and I must get it right.

The frustrating thing is that somewhere lost at home i have a lovely, red-leather bound notebook with perfectly spaced lines.  It has no ring binding, but it was a present from a dear friend- and this covers up a multitude of sins.  It seems appropriate too- because my current writing notebook was a gift as well.  A simple pink notebook with a black panel filled with poka-dots.

But my beloved poka-dot journal is on it's last legs.  And appropriately enough- there is just enough space to take the notes I need to finish my novel.

I think that is partly why this is an important purchase.  This is the next stage.  This notebook will be for my next writing project, my next novel.  That idea fills me with excitement.  What fun I will have!  What ideas will be worked on and processed and work-shoped or will just come?

And such ideas need a pretty place to play.