A Quiet Heart

Yesterday I began reading a book by Elisabeth Elliot called Keep a Quiet Heart.  I haven't read very much of the book yet, but what I have read so far has me looking forward to the rest of the book.

The book opens with a quote from Annie Keary, a woman who lived in the 19th century.  This quote is probably what kept me from reading any further into the book than I did.  I kept coming back to the words of Annie Keary!

Here's the quote:

"I think I find most help in trying to look on all the interruptions and hindrances to work that one has planned out for oneself as discipline, trials sent by God to help one against getting selfish over one's work.  Then one can feel that perhaps one's true work - one's work for God - consists in doing some trifling haphazard thing that has been thrown into one's day.  It is not a waste of time, as one is tempted to think, it is the most important part of the work of the day - the part one can best offer to God.  After such a hindrance, do not rush after the planned work; trust that the time to finish it will be given sometime, and keep a quiet heart about it."

How do you view the interruptions in your day?  As divine appointments or as irritations?  I confess that I more often see them as irritations rather than as "trials sent by God to help one against getting selfish"!

Three things Annie Keary said jumped out to me.  Three phrases from that paragraph stuck with me.  Three things to remember in the daily challenges of life.

Do not rush.

Trust.

Keep a quiet heart.

In the challenges and frustrations and irritations and interruptions of life, that's good advice.

That's my prayer today. No matter what comes my way. No matter what I have to deal with.

Lord, give me a quiet heart.  Amen.