SNOW DAY

"He makes me lie down by still waters. He restores my soul." - Psalm 23

The first major snow storm of the season arrived early Saturday morning. If the wind had been a factor in the midst of this weather event, we would have called it "The Blizzard of 2009" in Lancaster County. As such it was about a foot of snow that began arriving in earnest around 6 a.m. and continued throughout the day. Just a lightly falling snow as it got dark but it blanketed the landscape with an unblemished white covering.

This "happening" made my wife Dianne's day. She loves the warm, coziness of cocooning at home with no need to leave the house or do anything useful. It's a day to just relax, make a cup of hot cocoa,ignore your "to do" list, and be pleasantly non-social. For a day she (and the rest of us) can suspend our daily grind and relentless stresses and just "be" instead of "doing." I spent four quiet hours in my office, uninterrupted and unhurried, as I finished preparations for Sunday and doing some semi-useful puttering and reorganizing. I enjoyed a little football and basketball and a couple of unplanned naps. For a pastor who has been compared to the Energizer Bunny, it was a nice and refreshing change of pace.

Sometimes we just need to "time out", an impromptu sabbath, a time to slow down and catch our breath. Snow storms and snow days give the obsessive compulsive and workaholics among us a justification for something we really need--a time to lie down by still waters--and let God refresh us.

(C) 2009 by Stephen L Dunn