'Sometimes God uses the desert as a refresh button for our hunger and thirst for Him.'

It was dark in the concert I was at last night when the artist on stage spoke those words. I fumbled through my purse to find something to write it down on.

I don't appreciate the desert when I first walk into it. I often look around bewildered, wondering how I got here. Then panic sets in. How do I get out? Seems that by the time I realize I've walked into the desert, I'm so far in that civilization looks out of reach.

What I don't like about the desert is that it's often my own misdirection that ended me up there in the first place. What I love about the desert is that it replaces my absurd and misplaced sense of self reliance with desperation for Him.
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A little while later in the concert, we got a call revealing heartbreak and loss in the life of one we love here at Memorial. Today at work, calls came in from other directions as well revealing more significant struggles in the lives of other loved ones.
Life was under the magnifying glass. What would have stressed me out a few days ago seems silly. What I didn't have time for then, I desire to shift to now. Much of what I did invest myself in now seems to lack it's former significance. It's funny how true pain becomes the litmus test for petty agitation and stress.

It's not that I think we have to live in the midst of tragedy all the time to have a right perspective on life. I laughed today - and hard. I discussed light poles, carpet cleaning, and placed orders for copy paper. All of those were as much a rightful part of the day as the conversations I had about funerals, and cancer, and pain.
It's just that I am desperate to put those things in their proper place more today than I am other days. To have the conversations with the PSO guys, and appreciate them as a individual representations of my God's knitting than just a meeting to check off my appointment list. To take the stressed out phone calls, "backseat" my own abilities, insecurities or reasoning, and rest in God's presence having priority & purpose to drive the situation.
To boot insecurity and fear out the door because they leave me with a pile full of nothing for all the energy they extract from me.

Our God sustains us. He upholds, and frees and comforts and rewards us. He is worthy of praise... always.