When Messy Went Mod

Not too many years go when you saw a hamburger on an advertisement it was all neatly under the bun top. Pimento and cheese slathered smoothly over perfect bread. Clothes were always ironed. Shoes always clean. Everything matched. Rooms showed no sign of being lived in.

I noticed the change today like never before. My pimento and cheese looked perfect to me with small gaping holes in the coverage. Some cheese hanging over the sides. When did this come to be...this new presentation of what life is supposed to look like? I'm wondering.

Maybe messy came with "Shabby Chic", grunge, and recycling. But I'm thinking it came with
realization that the world is actually out of our control. From the sixties came the assassination of our president, later rioting and mass protests over a war we could not control. Later in the eighties we watched as our space program suddenly had a problem and we lost our crew before our very eyes. This very day in 1986. In the year 2001 we helplessly watched as a part of every picture of NYC skyline disappeared along with thousands of innocent people. Our war department attacked, our air traffic now shutdown, men and women taking their life in their hands and crashing a plane. A plane headed to destroy our nations capital or the White House. Now there are floods and major snow storms, political upheaval in many countries, near each other, all at the same time.
It's no wonder we see messy as mod.

What I love is that our order is no longer so focused on the external. It is where it should be and can be on the internal. Within the last few weeks, this has come across my path many times over:

"In this world you will have trouble.
But take heart!
I have overcome the world." Jesus , from John 16:33b

Just this morning:

"And surely I am with you always,
even to the very end of the age." Jesus last words in Matthew 28:20b

I find my heart gladdened every time I think on these words of His. He does have the last word.
He is the Alpha and the Omega. I am know this messy world was on His heart as He said those words so long ago....even then, we were on His heart, too.