{"id":2814,"date":"2012-07-09T10:14:19","date_gmt":"2012-07-09T14:14:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/simplelife\/?p=2814"},"modified":"2012-07-09T11:14:55","modified_gmt":"2012-07-09T15:14:55","slug":"the-inspector","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/2012\/07\/the-inspector.html","title":{"rendered":"The Inspector"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
The Inspector<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

While others may balk at their loss of privacy because of inspectors who invade their space, I’ve become quite comfortable with it. \u00a0In fact, my daily inspector is not even a human being. \u00a0It is a squirrel. \u00a0That’s right…the brown, fuzzy rodent who jumps from branch to branch, tree to tree and rooftop to attic. \u00a0Each morning as I sit in my back yard, The Inspector comes to complain about everything. \u00a0Rude and pushy, he chirps and squawks at every change I make in the garden. \u00a0On the days I trim major portions from his favorite jumping trees, I am scolded severely.<\/p>\n

For several years, I thought this was my imagination until my sister came to spend a few weeks with me. \u00a0Several mornings she, too, wandered onto the patio to have a quiet time with the Lord. \u00a0“There is a squirrel in your yard that is terribly rude and bossy,” she reported to me after a few days. \u00a0Because her family has raised squirrels and kept them as pets, she is familiar with their attitudes and personalities. \u00a0“I’ve seen bossy and rude squirrels before but never one that tried to push me<\/strong> into submission.”<\/p>\n

“Oh, yeah,” I told her. \u00a0“He comes every morning to inspect me and tell me how to run things around the yard.”<\/p>\n

This morning I was pondering a disturbing dream that woke me up. As I sat quietly, minding my own business, The Inspector approached. \u00a0His rotten attitude had not improved. \u00a0He sat staring at me to be sure that I was paying attention. \u00a0Then he began his complaints. \u00a0For about five minutes, he ranted in his familiar cherps, squeaks and squawks.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Suddenly, I recognized those sounds. \u00a0That squirrel sounded amazingly like me. \u00a0Shocked, they were exactly like the prayers of complaint that I was mouthing to the Lord while attempting to decipher my distrubing dream. \u00a0I laughed and spoke out loud, “That’s what I sound like to you, isn’t it, Lord?”<\/p>\n

“Pretty much ” was the casual reply the Holy Spirit spoke to my heart. \u00a0“Pretty much.”<\/p>\n

My concern stemmed from a loss of control in some of the areas in my private life. \u00a0Clearly, I could see that The Inspector was trying to direct me while his simple squirrel mind could not possibly understand property rights, ownership or other complicated mankind matters that demanded that I must often distrub his home and playground.<\/p>\n

In the same way, I cannot possibly understand how God owns and directs all of the heavens and earth. \u00a0Of course, He is deeply concerned about me and those things which effect me; but I cannot begin to fathom how my small portion is deeply intertwined into His plan for all of the universe. \u00a0While I’m no small cog to Him, in the overall history of mankind, my momentary hickups are not at all unnerving to the Creator.<\/p>\n

Finally, the squirrel was distracted and left me to sort out his concerns and unbelief. \u00a0The Inspector cannot possibly understand that I truly have no control over his squirrelish life and livelihood. \u00a0However, I sat for a few moments\u00a0deeply grateful that God understands and holds me gently in his hands soothing and answering even my most trivial complaints.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

While others may balk at their loss of privacy because of inspectors who invade their space, I’ve become quite comfortable with it. \u00a0In fact, my daily inspector is not even a human being. \u00a0It is a squirrel. \u00a0That’s right…the brown, fuzzy rodent who jumps from branch to branch, tree to tree and rooftop to attic.…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":387,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,20,3,397,40,186,49,16,8],"tags":[690,21,696,7,699,715,701,694,689,6,700,307],"class_list":["post-2814","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-christianity","category-church","category-developmental-disabilities","category-devotions","category-faith","category-hope","category-inspiration","category-intellectual-disability","category-mentally-challenged-community","tag-autism-spectrum","tag-christian","tag-church","tag-developmental-disabilities-2","tag-faith","tag-hope","tag-inspiration","tag-intellectual-disability","tag-mentally-challenged-community","tag-simple-scriptural-truths","tag-spirituality","tag-squirrels"],"yoast_head":"\nThe Inspector - A Simple Life, a Childlike Faith<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/2012\/07\/the-inspector.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Inspector - A Simple Life, a Childlike Faith\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"While others may balk at their loss of privacy because of inspectors who invade their space, I’ve become quite comfortable with it. \u00a0In fact, my daily inspector is not even a human being. \u00a0It is a squirrel. \u00a0That’s right…the brown, fuzzy rodent who jumps from branch to branch, tree to tree and rooftop to attic.…\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/2012\/07\/the-inspector.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"A Simple Life, a Childlike Faith\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2012-07-09T14:14:19+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2012-07-09T15:14:55+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/simplelife\/files\/2012\/07\/The-Inspector.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Linda G. Howard\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"The Inspector - A Simple Life, a Childlike Faith","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/2012\/07\/the-inspector.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"The Inspector - A Simple Life, a Childlike Faith","og_description":"While others may balk at their loss of privacy because of inspectors who invade their space, I’ve become quite comfortable with it. \u00a0In fact, my daily inspector is not even a human being. \u00a0It is a squirrel. \u00a0That’s right…the brown, fuzzy rodent who jumps from branch to branch, tree to tree and rooftop to attic.…","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/2012\/07\/the-inspector.html","og_site_name":"A Simple Life, a Childlike Faith","article_published_time":"2012-07-09T14:14:19+00:00","article_modified_time":"2012-07-09T15:14:55+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/simplelife\/files\/2012\/07\/The-Inspector.jpg"}],"author":"Linda G. Howard","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/2012\/07\/the-inspector.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/2012\/07\/the-inspector.html","name":"The Inspector - A Simple Life, a Childlike Faith","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/2012\/07\/the-inspector.html#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/2012\/07\/the-inspector.html#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/simplelife\/files\/2012\/07\/The-Inspector.jpg","datePublished":"2012-07-09T14:14:19+00:00","dateModified":"2012-07-09T15:14:55+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/#\/schema\/person\/a10d3530d8432a656d648135fe6da739"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/2012\/07\/the-inspector.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/2012\/07\/the-inspector.html"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/2012\/07\/the-inspector.html#primaryimage","url":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/simplelife\/files\/2012\/07\/The-Inspector.jpg","contentUrl":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/simplelife\/files\/2012\/07\/The-Inspector.jpg"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/2012\/07\/the-inspector.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"The Inspector"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/","name":"A Simple Life, a Childlike Faith","description":"Beliefnet Voices - Linda Howard","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/#\/schema\/person\/a10d3530d8432a656d648135fe6da739","name":"Linda G. Howard","description":"Linda G. Howard is the best-selling and award-winning author of four books, including MOTHERS ARE PEOPLE, TOO and THE SECRET LIFE OF A HOUSEWIFE. Currently, she serves as area director of The Special Gathering, a ministry within the mentally challenged community. Additionally, she is the co-publisher and editor of CONNECTING POINT, the ministry newsletter. Her husband is a retired aerospace technologist who worked for NASA. They have three children and four grandchildren.","sameAs":["http:\/\/specialgathering.wordpress.com"],"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/author\/lhoward"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2814","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/387"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2814"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2814\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2817,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2814\/revisions\/2817"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2814"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2814"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2814"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}