how much longer????

How much longer until the elections are over??? Some days when I look at my email 'in box', I just scratch my head and wonder if we can all hang on til this is finally over. People on both sides of the fence have very strong opinions, feeling and convictions about this race. It's one of the most heated in a while. Sometimes I wonder if it's because there is a lot at stake. But then again, I'm the most un-political person I know.. so I really have no idea if that's true or not. It's just how the media is making us feel.

An aside here~ even though I am un-political, it doesn't mean I don't vote. It just means all of this mess doesn't consume my every thought, as it does some people. Having said that, let's move on.

Yes, I am worried about our country. Yes, I'm concerned about how things are going. But I've also been praying and listening to God. And very often He uses simple things to speak. An example, I remember memorizing "God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth." John 4:24. That is a simple, short verse but I can't begin to tell you how many times and in how many ways God has brought that verse to mind and taught me something new from it.

Something I read a while back that's in my sidebar is Me, Myself & Bob by Phil Vischer, the creator of Veggie Tales. I know you're probably wondering what Veggie Tales and the story of a creative visionary with a heart for little kids and some stories to tell and how his dream went belly-up has to do with anything political. Well.. here goes. This book is sort of like that verse. God has used it to show me so many things. Sometimes I'm amazed at what God can bring me to see from things that can seem unrelated. This book is about his building of Veggie Tales.. the company, the employees.. how it grew and grew and how he struggled to manage something that felt like it was getting out of hand. Until finally near the end of the book, he describes the trial that finally ended it all for him. He talks about how this changed his life. Finally he wasn't in charge of all that stuff and he felt like a big weight had been lifted off of him. He went into a time of humbly seeking the Father and He began giving him new stories to tell and opening up new doors. And he was happy and pleased in the end with the way things turned out for him, since he was now having a vibrant relationship with God and was seeing God move in his work in a way he hadn't seen before. And then the verdict was overturned. A verdict that seemed so cut and dry in the first place. A verdict that should have been an easy win for him and Veggie Tales. The one that ended with him losing everything and walking away. But do you know what Phil did??? He laughed! Because he could see the end result.

When I look at where things are now politically and how serious things look for our country, I get scared. And I think surely God sees this and is going to work things out in our favor because where would we be otherwise. It seems so cut and dry to us sometimes. Much like the trial. It was obvious in our eyes what the right verdict should have been, but God had other plans. What if He doesn't see fit to work this election out the way we see it? What if He does things in a different way... a way that seems hard and difficult? A way that seems to be the obvious wrong 'verdict'. I hope we can be drawn to the Father in a more real way... that we can begin to see Him working out His plan, even when things look bad.

God is bigger than the boogie man... even if he's the opposing candidate and he wins.