Scheduling the impossible

5:17 p.m. Today's project was to create a 2011 desk calendar.

Last Christmas, I received a beautiful light cherrywood desk calendar from Levenger that fits nicely on the end of my kitchen counter. Its ringbound filler is long and streamlined, with just the right amount of space to pencil in my appointments, Bible studies, meetings and notes. Unlike many daytimers, the first day on the left is Sunday, not Monday. I love that, because the Lord's Day really is the start of a believer's week. The calendar sits propped forward at a tilt, with room for pencils, pens, business cards, erasers, pins and paper clips at the back, where they don't become unsightly.

"Time for a refill," I noted to family members, circling the item in the catalog, but apparently no one wanted to repeat a gift. And I guess a calendar refill is a little on the dull side, unless you are a task-oriented nerd like me. The finances were (and are) tight, causing me to concentrate on gifts for others, so what was I to do? The last page only goes until today!

A few days ago, the Lord gave me the idea of turning the refill over, where the opposite sides are printed with blocked-out spaces for notes and events. Why not get a ruler and a 2011 wall calendar, or scroll down on the one on my cell phone, and create a 2011 calendar myself? Bless the Lord, who is so creative and attends to even relatively trivial needs of His children. I am so grateful that He does! So I began the project, reminiscing about the way I used to fill in all the dates in my teacher's grade book. I told my teacher daughter Heidi who was seated nearby at the kitchen table, that somehow, writing each date in ahead for every nine-week quarter made the year seem shorter! "Holiday here! Minimum day there! Off for parent conferences, or field trips, or all-day events." Once you have visualized all the way to Christmas break, spring break or the last day of school, you think, "Yes! I can survive!" A teacher can truly say, "Teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom. (Psalm 90:12 )

Much as I enjoyed my 18 year teaching career, I don't regret my 2009 retirement--at least not yet! God's timing is perfect, always.

As I continued measuring and drawing out the year while watching the Rose Parade, it became fun to jot in birthdays, Easter, holidays, anniversaries, and Heidi's wedding. Some dates in August I don't have yet, like Steven's collegiate national bodybuilding competition in Milwaukee, or the day for Steve's and my renewal of vows and 30th wedding anniversary celebration. I'm now most of the way through, noting Patriot Day September 11th-- so deeply sad, but worthy of 2011's 10-year commemoration. As the calendar dates come to an end, wonderful Thanksgiving and glorious Christmas will be marked in, and maybe I'll add a little decoration on each of their pages...it is my personal calendar after all!

Some events are not only impossible to calendar, but completely unknowable. When will an unsaved loved one come to Christ? When will a backslider return? Will a new baby be on the way for any of our young marrieds? What ministries will any of us be called to? What will Steve's Alzheimer's condition be like in 2011, or will God heal him? Whom will God call into eternity among our family and friends? Will God summon the Church home in the Rapture?

All of those possibilities are definitely on God's calendar, as He reaches out of infinity into our time-blocked world, but we humans can only speculate, hope, pray, or wonder.

And that's the excitement of being alive--especially, being alive in Christ!