passie prison

At three years old, my sweet baby Mackenzie was still clinging to the only life she knew.  Life with her bappie.  (and in case you aren’t clear, bappie was my daughter’s loving term for her pacifier.) Not long ago I began restricting her access to it, only for nap time and bed time and emergencies that involved major meltdowns in public or injury.  Which, okay, as I type the words I realize she had her bappie more often than not.

Two weekends ago it all came to an end.  Bappie was lost, never to be found again.  It was dramatic.  There was much wailing and gnashing of teeth.  literally.  I wasn’t sure we would survive loosing something that brought so much security.

Long story, short: We survived.  She doesn’t request it.  She doesn’t cry over it.  In fact, without it she has become the most sassy, robust, chatty and happy little preschooler I could have every imagined. (I had no idea she had so much to say without that bappie in the way.)  Why?  I suppose it is because she is no longer relying on something she didn’t need in the first place.

And that makes me think.

How much satisfaction and peace and joy am I missing because I’m searching for and holding closely the things I don’t need?  Things. stuff.  junk.  I count on them.  I find security in my surroundings; I look for my contentment in the things that I don’t really need. If I don’t get my way or I don’t get what I want I find myself in a similar situation, like my daughters: held hostage, in total anguish and agony over things I never needed to begin with.  And that is a self-made prison.

But, I read excellent news this morning.  There is freedom, given by the only One who I truly do need. And that one is Jesus Christ, The Lord.

Here are the words that I just read from Psalm 146:

Praise the Lord, O my soul!
² While I live I will praise the Lord;
I will sing praises to my God while I have my being.

³ Do not put your trust in princes,
Nor in a son of man, in whom there is no help.
⁴ His spirit departs, he returns to his earth;
In that very day his plans perish.

⁵ Happy is he who has the God of Jacob for his help,
Whose hope is in the Lord his God,
⁶ Who made heaven and earth,
The sea, and all that is in them;
Who keeps truth forever,
⁷ Who executes justice for the oppressed,
Who gives food to the hungry.
The Lord gives freedom to the prisoners.

⁸ The Lord opens the eyes of the blind;
The Lord raises those who are bowed down;
The Lord loves the righteous.
⁹ The Lord watches over the strangers;
He relieves the fatherless and widow;
But the way of the wicked He turns upside down.

¹⁰ The Lord shall reign forever—
Your God, O Zion, to all generations.