Wednesday, July 1, 2009

keep

This word keeps coming to my mind, over and over, day after day.

~Keep~

I looked it up online for a definition, cuz if you don't recall....I'm un-cool. Dictionary.com has 55 definitions for "keep". Seriously?

This word hurts my feelings. I don't care what dictionary.com says, we can't keep anything. Can we?

I can't keep my kids. Spencer has already proven this to me. Guess what folks, they grow up. They move out. Or, they fade, expire, pass on...... I just can't say "die".

I can't keep my wits. Sometimes.... I lose it.

I can't keep my friends with any form of a guarantee. They too, might expire, move on, stop returning phone calls. Here today, gone tomorrow. It's possible.

I can't keep my senses. Maybe I can. But no promises. My friend Lisa lost her sense of smell and sense of taste in a cheerleading accident, over 20 years ago. Seriously people....no guarantees.

I can't keep my figure. Actually....that one left me in the summer of '06. Oh I could keep my current figure....sure, that's totally doable. Lovely. Stretch marks, squishy pudge, a little extra junk in the trunk.... this one is certainly within the realm of possibility.

My new car will be old someday, or it will be smashed. Can't keep it. Sure can't take it to heaven with me.


Can't keep my marriage. God might bless me with it until death do us part....but even that is proof that I can't keep Joe and Joe can't keep me. Even if we vanish together.... it couldn't be kept. It all goes away, eventually.

I can't keep you entertained. I can't keep my thoughts straight. I can't even keep the memories of the precious things Asher said yesterday because my brain is weak. I have to write them down to remember them, and I can't keep paper. It gets lost. I can't even keep a journal on my computer because it might crash and even if I keep these memories in this blog forever in a forum saved on the web, there is no guarantee that even that won't crash and burn, eventually. And besides, I can't keep passwords. What if I can't access my own blog? This is more possible than you might realize. Pitiful.....

I can't keep my heart pure. I have to beg God everyday to do that for me. Only He can keep me on track, on a path to Him. I can't even keep my head on straight.

I can't keep money. Someone always bills me for it.

I can't keep my opinions to myself...well not ALL of them. I have tried.

I can't keep my mind made-up. It changes.

I can't keep promises. I think I can. I usually do. But if I have any ability to keep a promise, it is probably conditional on the premise that you deserve it, and I could easily fail someday to keep your secret safe with me. Isn't there always the threat of exposure? On a side note....this might be why we should confess to one another and lay it all out there in a willingness to be open, authentic and transparent so that God can do His work in us and through us. Secrets weren't made to be kept. We sure can't keep them from God. Trust me....doesn't work.

I can't keep my sanity. Same as wits, perhaps. See above.

Sometimes I can't even keep faith. The devil doesn't like me because I love Jesus and I want you to know and love Jesus....and he works on me. He bugs me. He pushes me around a little from time to time and he hopes I fall. What if I can't Keep my balance? Sometimes I doubt and just keep asking for clarity. I can't keep clarity.

You can't keep your job. Someday, if not today....you are replaceable. I.am.replaceable!


You can't keep your life....not even your big, extraordinary, shiny life. Just ask Michael Jackson and Farrah Fawcett...wait, sorry, you can't ask them. They couldn't keep breathing.

We can't keep our children small, sweet, and snuggly. We can't keep them clean. We certainly can't keep them quiet.


When we die...and I'm pretty sure we all will unless the blessed rapture happens before (Oh praise Ye God for such a possibility!).... when we die, we'll either be kept by God or kept by Satan. We keep nothing....not the house, the car, the career, the trophies, the awards, not the crafts and the scrapbooks, not the cute clothes....nothing.

Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep.

Everything else is temporary. We keep nothing.

1 comment:

Sarah said...

Just one thing we CAN keep... our treasure in heaven. I know you've got a lot stored up there!