Finding Significance

I've always been a paper pack rat.  I've kept newsclippings, wedding invitations, post cards, notes, teaching outlines, photos, journals, and other stuff that have been meaningful to me.  Throughout the years, I've been methodical about caring for these scraps of paper, my archives of past events.  I've punched holes into the side of each document that I've found worthy of keeping and entered them into a loose leaf notebook.  Dozens of these notebooks are upstairs in a closet.  In addition to my own memorabilia, I have possession of the old diaries of my mother-in-law and of my mother.  Over the years I have been tempted to discard these archives of the past, but I haven't.  More than once I've wondered about the purpose of keeping all of this.

It is said that when a person dies, especially an older person, an entire library of knowledge is gone.  And so it is!  But until that time, each of us carries a richness of life expeiences that make us who we are.  And those experiences are often what we share with other people in conversation or in other ways.  For myself, I find writing and artwork to be an outlet for reflecting upon the experiences and truths that God has blessed me with over a lifetime.

Lately, I've been going through my archives and jotting down notes to remind me of events and people from the past and then discarding the original documents.  My notes take up a lot less room than the documents.  There is significance in each document, a meaning to why I kept the scrap of paper.  For instance, in the above picture you can see a postcard of the girl scout camp where I was a counselor, my wedding invitation, a newspaper clipping of when I worked on the high school yearbook, an e-mail from my daughter-in-law as she awaited the birth of her first child, a picture of my husband receiving his warrant officer rank, and various other items.

All of us long to find meaning to our lives.  I think that is why I have kept my own personal archives.  As I am reviewing and consolidating my scraps of papers lately, I take note of the meaning of each item. At this time in my life, I find significance in how richly God has blessed me with people I have known and insight I have gleaned from the past.  I hope that these memories will be the means by which I can bless others in my attempts to write words of spiritual encouragement.

"Great are the works of the LORD, studied by all who delight in them.  Full of splendor and majesty is his work."  Psalm 111:1-3 

When I review the richness of my life, look at the marvels of nature, or read of Jesus Christ in the Bible, I cannot help but recognize God's work of splendor and majesty.  There is something to be said for pausing to study God's work in our lives (even in the hard times), His work in the natural world, and His redeeming work on behalf of mankind through Jesus.  It is in recognizing God's hand in everything that we find our life's greatest meaning and significance.