Tears burned my eyes, as I remembered a Sunday night long ago when I was just a 15 year old teenager. I was on the balcony ledge right outside our house. I was talking to a preacher friend of ours. As we were talking you could hear the pleasant racket coming from inside, it was full of friends and family from our old Baptist church there in Mexico.They were all laughing, joking, singing off key, playing Nerf ping pong, and drinking chamomile tea, munching on sweet bread while talking about the preaching, the Bible, or just ...life. I was smiling and happy as I looked through the window of our house at the hustle and bustle going on in there, it was a warm and inviting atmosphere. I was happy, and content with my life.
This is the patio ledge, and me when I was 15 with my Dad
My friend must have notice the glow on my face and read my mind, because out of the blue he just said: "Andrea, things are going to change. They are not always going to be like this."
I looked at him sadly and tears started to burn my eyes, I didn't like what he said but I knew it was true. Things always did change, that is the way God planned it. I didn't want it to change, I wanted life to be the same as it was that day.
And after that, the years rolled by. As I left home to go to college, I thought of that night and those words my friend had said to me. For I left my Mom crying at the top of the stairs saying good by to me as I hopped down two steps at a time I looked longingly back at my Mom. I did not want to leave, I wanted to stay with my parents forever. But I had to go, Dad was waiting for me in the car and it was time. I left, I closed the metal door behind me and got into our old white Suburban. Tears were rolling down my cheeks as I looked longingly back.
When I would wake up in the morning to go to school or work in my early twenties I would think of how my life had changed so much. I missed Mexico, my Mom, my Dad the warm sweet chamomile nights. I'd cry, wishing my life wouldn't have changed so much.
A few more years later when my sister called me to tell me Dad had fallen off a latter and had broken his legs, I cried. I didn't like the way life was changing. Two weeks later and just 2 months before I got married my Daddy passed away unexpectedly. I cried bitterly for a very long time.
Life not only was changing but it also was not going the way I had planned it. As time went by I kept on recalling that day, that night when my preacher friend said to me. "Andrea, things are going to change, they are not always going to be like this." It has stuck in my head and in my heart throughout the years that have flown by. My life is so different now, but God has worked it out. God knows what is best for me, and as I sat on the sofa today with tears stinging my eyes once more, I cried, but this time because I was happy, again I am content that the change in my life has worked out so beautifully, the Lord has blessed me so much with the most thoughtful and kind husband, two precious healthy daughters and even though I know that my little girls are growing and changing as I write this. It will be OK. If the Lord tarries, and I stay in His will, someday I will look at my life and be happy and be content with whatever God has done with it. I have so much more to learn, I have so much yet to do, I want to be wiser. I want to be a better wife and mother. I want to to be a better friend and witness to others. I just thank the Lord for holding my hand, helping me and always being there as I grow older, as the time changes and my years fly by. Tears may always come to my eyes when I hear that old sentence again and again in my past, reminding me of my ever changing present, and my unknown future. But now I have learned to trust my Lord with my life.
May my life be a glory to my Lord always. For the Lord is good and His mercies endures FOREVER
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