trust God but have a, um no don’t.

so me and tbV have been in a place of really trusting God for the future and for just general every day life and i haven’t wanted to blog about a lot of it because when you start mentioning stuff and people start responding to ‘save you from the crises’ then it kinda cancels out a lot of the trust element…

but i will say this. when you are trusting God and not having a backup plan, then when things are going well and it appears that you are fine and sorted and when the provision arrives and so on, then it is an amazing place to be.

when it doesn’t or it hasn’t yet or it looks like it might not, then it’s not so much fun. in fact, it can get kinda scary and you know, i think that’s the point.

i just don’t want people to get all romanticised by the idea of trusting God without a backup plan – as i like to say I’m pretty sure that, when David got back from killing Goliath, when Gideon got back from slaying all those Midianites and when Daniel was let out of the lion’s den, they all three had to go and change their pants, or robes, or something.

i would imagine you can trust God but still crap yourself at the same time. possibly cos trusting God, like Love and Forgiveness is not a feeling but a choice and an action linked to that choice. But maybe that’s just me.

“Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge Him and He will direct your path.” Proverbs 3.5,6

botswanan reflection: the animals

so the beautiful val and i just got back from a rad and timely botswana trip with good friends dreadlock mike and nancy the twin and also some friends of theirs (brent, zeldy, norm and kate) and have some incredible memories of a stunning, stunning place

we were really spoilt with the animal sightings – elephant (including the smallest baby elephants i have ever seen), giraffe, wildebeest (including the lesser known pussybeest and the lonely Nigel-no-friends who was always wondering around by himself while the rest of the herd was sneaking away over the hill somewhere), warthog, eland, kudu, impala, steenbok, ostrich, hyena, jackal (and very cute baby jackal who resemble paris hilton’s handbag dog), spring hare (which is a very boring name for the nocturnal cross between a rabbit and a kangaroo and one of the highlights of our frequent nite drives), zebra and tortoise, not to mention lion and cubs (which we got to see from uber uber close as they rested under a thick bush after a recent kill)

one of the highlights for me was seeing a jackal run past our vehicle with the complete head and neck of an impala hanging out of its mouth – nature in full 3D action…

armed with Gerrie the ranger (who can identify an animal at night purely by seeing the colour of the eyes shining back from the spotlight sweep across the bushes) we got to do early morning, mid-afternoon, sundowner and late nite drives and every day would see a new animal or new animal experience which we had not seen before (vultures – and friends – circling a dead hyena, elephants taking a mud bath, a jackal family with some very young pups, an empty tortoise shell) and just really soak up the beauty – and very green – that is botswana, or the part of it in the south-east that we were in anyways…