a view through annie's eyes

The new spicy chicken biscuit from Chick-Fil-A induced a guilt session for most of my morning. I’m a Southern girl who loves herself some biscuits, and truth be known, sausage and gravy. This particular morning, The Chicken was giving away free ones so I lined up and without any thought to my New Year resolutions, totally blew my diet in less than three minutes.  It was embarrassing driving up to the gym to throw away my fast food sack but I got over it. However, the elliptical wasn’t as forgiving and I felt rather ill for most of the thirty-seven minutes it took me to burn half of the calories I had blown. 

Driving home from the gym, I thought through a  conversation from last night. We were celebrating my friend Cathy’s birthday, and we were all a bit out of sorts. We’re at that age where we have a few aches and pains and we don’t mind chatting about it. We love each other too much not to ask “How’s your reflux?” Or “Is that hip still bothering you?” We also have been to enough doctors that we entertain ourselves as diagnosticians when one of us presents symptoms. And, frankly, we are pretty good at it. We’re all doing life the best we can and basically we are a healthy bunch. Even in sickness, my friend  is doing extremely well and that was a big part of our celebration last evening. 

As I was driving, I realized how evident God’s Glory was last night as we talked about miracle after miracle in each of our lives. We were celebrating the birthday of a woman who was diagnosed over 20 years ago with aggressive breast cancer. We look forward to both of my friends’ newest grandchildren to be born this year . One is a Snowflake baby. Check it out if you’re unfamiliar with the term.  As I smiled at God’s goodness, my car radio provided the perfect background theme. David Crowder whispered “When all of a sudden, I am unaware of these afflictions eclipsed by Glory. And I realize just how beautiful You are and how great Your affection…How He Loves us, O how he loves us…”We chuckled at our irritating health issues. We celebrated miracles. We toasted Life.  And in each, “We beheld His Glory, full of Grace and Truth.”(John 1:14)