Everyone has their peculiar set of pet peeves.  No one is immune from this reality.  Some develop during the process of life.  Others may set deeper in our personality.  What they are and how we handle them determines much of our character.  There are those who seem to go out of control when confronted by one of these.  You find some people who learn to take such things in stride.  They recognize not every person is the same.  I sometimes wonder about why we feel the need to state the obvious.  Maybe this is one of those bad habits of mine.  But it just seems as if we miss the bigger picture when we get focused on a single aspect of anything.


Recent examples can be seen in books that fly off the shelves in stores.  One book made tons of money just by saying " Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus."  You would think no one ever realized gender differences exist.  Then came the one that says, "Don't sweat the small stuff, it's all small stuff."  Maybe our preferences say more about our not being in touch with real life as much as it does our reading choices.  We do have this innate ability to get wrapped up in our world to the point we forfeit our perspective.  Even believers get so excited over the insignificant way too often.  Someone once said, "The important is seldom urgent and the urgent is seldom important."  Surely some version of that quote is found in scripture somewhere.


I am a cancer survivor.  That means not just getting physically healthy but discovering how such a journey changes you.  At no point do I believe such a title makes me any better than another person.  Just be absolutely sure that my perspective is forever altered by my encounter.  Not everyone gets that.  You will always find those who want you to be as worked up over some matter as much as they are.  When you spend hours being poisoned in order to get well you decide that most everything really is small stuff.  Relationships matter greatly after such a time.  Children are essential when your earthly journey is threatened.  You no longer see events as "life and death" because you know what that truly means.  Adding a relationships with God into the equation only magnifies the learning.  Your mind, body and heart can never be the same.


We prayed for two years or so for a young woman diagnosed with a brutal form of cancer.  Regular updates were sent to us so we could continue our intercession on her behalf.  That life came to an end this week.  Each time someone leaves our world early due to this disease only strengthens my resolve to focus on the important.  My heart breaks regularly for those who do not share my outcome of treatment.  Far too many people waltz through this world without a sense of the fragility of life.  Their life is treated more as a right than as a gift.  I fully realize my small rant will not change a thing in the long run.  But this is at least a moment to drive my stake in the ground for the value of each day.  My one hope is more can come to this approach without going through grueling difficulty.  Then there may be more patience with others as we take God seriously in our every single day.


Bro. Trey