This is a Bustle

This is my second week of trying the "choose a random book, open to a random sentence, and then write about it" post. This week I opened some book about American Politics and the first sentence I read said, "This is a bustle".

I can honestly say that I have never heard this word used in this way. I have heard "hustle and bustle", and the city is "bustling", but never, "This is a bustle". So I looked up "bustle" and discovered that when used as a noun it is "an excited activity or movement".

I think my life the past two and half years have been a bustle. We had our third boy, quit a good job, moved my family to Israel because I wanted to see the Western Wall, I saw the Western Wall, we moved back, began a new church, and now work 2-3 jobs. This truly has been and is "excited activity and movement".

I guess with this definition, I could say that our 2 year old is a "bustle". He is the most easy-going of our three boys, but he never stops moving. He wakes up and begins the process of exploring the world from his little 2 foot high perspective. He plays with his brothers' toys, he terrorizes the dog by chasing him with a spray bottle or by sticking things in his (the dog's) nose, and he constantly searches for candy. We literally had to purge our entire house of candy because he would search through every drawer and cupboard until he found some. He even found old Halloween candy that we hid from the older boys years ago. Because our 2 year old is a bustle, he does things the others never did but he constantly entertains us.

I don't want to "spiritualize" this too much, but I see God's work in my family's lives as a "bustle". It is exciting this year to see people move into new faith in Jesus, to see families fed through a "food box" project led by people in our church community, and to see friends work on giving up harmful addictions and turn towards Jesus. It has been amazing, and challenging, to see God provide all that we need this year even though the economy is struggling and my jobs pay less than before. It is great to see the "excited activity" of God as He gives us vision and strength for each day and the internal peace that is content to see what the future holds.

Life is often a bustle for all of us. I just hope that in those moments of "excited activity and movement" that we take time to enjoy it and breathe it all in.