Look away, preacher man

"Listen to me, Lord, and answer me, for I am helpless and weak." Psalm 86: 1

I've officially reached the stage of "what if they don't (fill in the blank here)." My candidates roam from like, listen, follow, feed, find me sane. Any will do, depending upon the time of day and the rash that springs up from wondering if they will (fill in the blank here).

They are new churches, er, new congregations. New folks who don't know me, us.

This starting over is a bit (fill in the blank here) My candidates are exhilarating, scary, insanity producing.

We're so close to being packed we will finish it all Saturday. But the panic is setting in. Driving our menagerie of pets for three hours, pulling a trailer full of stuff with the corresponding addition of weight, and simply moving in with pets outside and no one knowing the dogs and all those things is just plain (fill in the blank here). My candidates are exhilarating, scary, insanity producing.

There are people I'm leaving behind, good people, friends for life kind of people, who have much more to be worried, scared, insanity producing about. Health. Kids they don't see. And on and on the world goes.

So, what is the lesson from all this (except never, never move)?

David, who wrote so wonderfully about having nothing but nothing in Psalm 89, wrote this in Psalm 90: "O Lord, you have always been our home. Before you created the hills or brought the world into being, you were eternally God and you will be God forever."

God goes before us. God can handle this. God will handle this.

A friend wrote the other day, "Billy, you will be fine. You have someone looking over you."

I pray that we all do. That friendships never die. That old times there, won't be forgotten. Look away, look away, look away ol' preacher man.