What I'm Learning Lately

Hmmmm, I keep thinking I am going to catch up on my family blog posts - some funny incidents, a great first birthday party, some first steps.... and yet God has been putting other blog-items on my heart.  Lately I have tried to ask daily - "God, what are you trying to teach me today?"  And wow, have I been learning a lot!  


So where to start with this one?  A little history perhaps.  College... Aggieland... what a fun time in my life.  I have so many amazing memories and it was such a great time of being independent but with no real responsibilities yet.  I knew it too - I remember telling myself repeatedly to savor those moments.  During college I also met about 5,000 "friends" and was quite the social butterfly.


Yet one interesting thing about college - a lot of the friendships were so fleeting.  You shared a class with some.  You shared a dorm floor with others.  You attended football games, Bible studies, sat in the dining hall together...  It was a revolving door of fun and people!  This became more apparent to me with the advent of Facebook.  I would get friend requests from Aggie friends and I had to rack my brain to even remember who some of them were.  However, Facebook has also given me the opportunity to get to know some of those casual friends better over the past several years.


There is one such friend - we will call him John here on the blog to protect his privacy.  I have gotten to know more about him through "social networking" via Facebook than I ever did in Aggieland.  So when his dad suddenly got sick a few weeks ago, I felt an unexpected tug at my heart for him - one that had me checking his Facebook page for updates, praying for his family, and even giving regular reports to my husband.  


Last night John lost his dad.  He left a very sweetly worded post on Facebook - about God sometimes choosing to heal our loved ones in heaven instead of here on Earth.  Next thing you know I am crying in my car.   Now, I do not consider myself a naturally compassionate person.  It seems to be an area where God is trying to mold me; to make me better.  I never know when compassion with "strike" - but strike it did today, as I think about my college friend and his family, and their terrible loss.