A woman at the Bible School I am living at gave me this verse last week.  It is a joy to share verses in the Bible which you find to be particularly helpful or inspiring.  As an exercise; trade a passage of scripture with your spouse, child or loved one.  As a caution: this should not be done for the sake of correcting how the other person is living.  The Bible is a book for correcting oneself, not one’s neighbor.  Use this practice to give insights to your own perceptions of your partner’s strengths or to your own weaknesses.

Please follow me now by reading Psalm 84.  It will only take a few minutes.

Know now, that I am the sparrow who has found a home.  In the house that I am dwelling in, the people are ever praising the LORD.  For those who don’t know me, I love the quiet.  I think part of what drew me to swimming as a child was the 30 second bursts in the clear with nothing but the hum of a pool-light, a heater, or Jacuzzi jets to keep your mind occupied.  It is so very nice under there.  Try and talk, or try and hear what someone outside is saying; impossible.  If I could hold my breath forever, I might just swim alone to the deepest parts of this worlds great oceans.  I do dream about this.

So it may surprise you to know that I am now drawn from my apartment on the third floor to the din of the second floor’s nightly ruckus.  I found this evening to be especially delightful.  Paridi and Tony were teaching each-other some acoustical guitar tricks.  Nella, Bruna, Petrit and Guiseppe were battling it out over Foosball.  David, Mimy, Risa, and Luka were having an impressive round of Ping-Pong.  Dixcierta and Etmira were in the kitchen preparing the evening meal.  Hana, Tina, Tina’s son David and Blarim were studying this week’s coursework.  Half a dozen other Italian students were dispersed about, going over things on their laptops.  I was reading a book for school.  And as I took a moment to reflect on what was going on I realized “Better is one day in your courts than a thousand elsewhere; I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than dwell in the tents of the wicked.”  I loved tonight, I thank God for tonight.  An evening like this would be beyond my ability to design or even to improve upon; and It happened as a natural consequence of a group of people who love God coming together to share fellowship.

I visited the U.S. Embassy in Tirana today to sort out some residency paperwork.  If you ever have a chance to go there, skip it.