Living in the Country

Finally a cold snap in the air. Maybe autumn is on it’s way at last. Grab your jacket, it’s going into the low 60’s today. The silly thing is, I’m serious. I have lived in California long enough now for 55° to make me feel the need for a jacket. After nearly a dozen years my Midwestern blood has thinned and I get cold. My relatives in the Minnesota and Wisconsin are laughing at me. 55° and you need an extra blanket at night? This shift has gotten me to thinking about where I live and how it is different than other places. In fact my husband teases me that we don’t live in America anymore, we live in California.

As a couple of transplanted mid-westerners we felt as if California was a foreign country when we moved here. There aren’t four seasons. We have sunny, sunnier, and rainy, rainier. There’s the sticker shock of real estate, sushi at Safeway, no smoking indoors, and flowers blooming in January. Many strange and wonderful things.

I also live in God’s country. There are foreign things in this landscape as well. Here is where the last are first, the meek inherit the earth, you pray for your enemies and you turn the other cheek.

I have learned to enjoy California. After twelve years some of the strangeness has worn off. I delight in the treats of flowers in January, beach days in November, and yes even sushi at Safeway. I’ve lived here long enough to be settled. What was at first bizarre has become ordinary.

I’ve become settled in God’s country too. I’ve lived here a long time. I am not always comfortable though, it can be a demanding place to live. However, the longer I live with God the more ordinary the landscape becomes; the easier it is to delight in the strangeness of his grand design. It is easier to turn the other cheek.

Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you. If someone strikes you on one cheek, turn to him the other also. Do to others as you would have them do to you.
Luke 6:27-29, & 31

Posted 10/2/2006 @ 4:42 PM | Weekly Thoughts