It's no secret I like science fiction, and the other day before Deniese left I was tormenting her by watching back to back episodes of a show called "Firefly".

This was quite surprising to her, because I don't watch much TV other than the news or a random cartoon now and then. To tune in every night of the week for a few hours of a wacky show featuring a western set in space (imagine Gunsmoke meets Star Wars) is just so much not like me my wife was starting to worry if I'd hit my head or something.

Anyhow, one of the shows was titled "Out of Gas" and like most shows you see the title then you start to get into the show and you forget all about it. In the episode, the engine is damaged and they can't repair it. I won't tell you any more other than I didn't "get" the title until long after the show was over and I thought back on it. They never had a fuel shortage, by the way.

Its funny how many things in life are like that - we are so caught up in the moment that only later do we reflect and something jumps out at us. I recall wondering if I would be a good dad or not when my son was born, but the subject never came up for the next 18 years. I think of all the decisions I made as a parent, and as a husband. How many times I second guessed myself, wondering if moving here was the right thing, if I'd said the right things at the right times, and if I should have kept this job or jumped to another one. So many forks came my way, and with prayer and my wife's blessing I chose one or the other.

Before my wife left to help with her dad, mom, and sister, we were reflecting together on these things. I was considering them because I reckon I will have more decisions to make in the future, and I wanted to learn from how we'd done so far. Her motives were much more, well, Godly. She was thinking how obvious it was that God had helped us all along the way, as long as we chose to walk in the light. When we needed friends, God gave us family through the church. When we were generous to others, God gave us blessings apparently because we'd shown good stewardship so far. When I got obnoxious, usually I was corrected gently (which believe it or not is among my most precious blessings). Personally, when I needed a special friend and had totally given up on finding one, I stumbled over Deniese.

We all ought to think long and hard about the lives we have, and God's part in them. Looking back I can see his hand clearly, nudging me away from trouble and drawing me on when I was moving in the right directions. When sometime tricks me over and over it is hard to trust them in the future; but when someone comes through for me over and over even when I am the one lurching around, when someone comes through for me in spite of my stubborn self, well it is much easier to put my faith in Him going forward and truly mean it when I say His will be done, in heaven and in earth, and in my life.

There are many blessings God gives us, but one of them is a mostly invisible substance that I surely require to exist and am thankful for. A direct physical action by God, handed down through the generations, something that defies science to explain or replicate in any lab under any conditions. His breath.

Randy