treasuring

For every time my little baby Gianna keeps us up late in the night, crying for some reason I can't discover, I think of a baby who never made a sound because she'd given up hope of getting a response to it.

For every time she starts crying her hungry little cry just an hour after she ate, I stop for a minute to be thankful that she can eat her fill whenever her little tummy tells her it's hungry.

For every time I hear baby grunts and coos coming from her bassinet and see two small hands flailing and two feet kicking when I'd hoped she might nap for a while, I pick her up and play with her anyway because this baby has a family and I have the time and there's no reason for her to sit alone.

And every time I don't stop to treasure each moment, each smile and sleepless night, my heart remembers that this isn't forever, that nothing is guaranteed. Time flies by so quickly and you never know what the next moment will bring.

So I try to make myself remember that this is true for all of life. When I do the dishes yet again and when the dog tries to drag me through our walk, every minute with my husband and all those moments far from my family, that gorgeous sunset and all the days of gray above my head when the sun doesn't even seem to exist anymore.

I read in Job this week of all that he was blessed with and all that he lost. And I feel with him when the verses show his grief, how he tore his robe and shaved his head and fell to the ground...but on the ground, in the dirt, he worshipped. And maybe as I learn to treasure all of life, I'll learn to give God the worship due Him when it's not the natural response of my heart to praise. Because He remains steadfast and unchanging no matter what life brings, shouldn't my respsonse to Him be the same--no matter what?