{"id":2489,"date":"2016-03-21T13:46:22","date_gmt":"2016-03-21T17:46:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/markspruill.com\/blog\/?p=2489"},"modified":"2016-03-21T13:51:59","modified_gmt":"2016-03-21T17:51:59","slug":"when-the-stars-decide-to-shine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/markspruill.com\/blog\/?p=2489","title":{"rendered":"When the Stars Decide to Shine"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">A few nights ago I went outside for a walk and Sam followed me out to look at the stars. \u00a0When he looked up and saw that the clouds had different plans, he grumbled. \u00a0\u201cWhy is it when I don&#8217;t want to look at the stars, they are shining bright, and every time I DO want to look at the stars, they are not out?\u201d \u00a0\u00a0He turned and marched back in the house, mad at a universe that was obviously conspiring against him.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">As I continued my walk, I thought about Sam\u2019s problem and wondered how the stars might answer his indictment. I suppose they might very well say, \u201cWhy is it, Sam, that every time we go to the trouble to shine, you never even come outside and look up?\u201d Sam\u2019s problem, I thought, was that he expects the universe to conform to his desires instead of just enjoying the blessings whenever and wherever they are provided. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The thing is, it\u2019s not really just Sam&#8217;s problem. It\u2019s my problem too. \u00a0It\u2019s a problem we all have. \u00a0We spend our lives complaining when the stars don&#8217;t shine on us. \u00a0Maybe instead we should be looking up expectantly every chance we get, and praising God for every twinkle.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A few nights ago I went outside for a walk and Sam followed me out to look at the stars. \u00a0When he looked up and saw that the clouds had different plans, he grumbled. \u00a0\u201cWhy is it when I don&#8217;t want to look at the stars, they are shining bright, and every time I DO [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2489","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-misc"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/markspruill.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2489","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/markspruill.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/markspruill.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/markspruill.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/markspruill.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2489"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/markspruill.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2489\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2492,"href":"https:\/\/markspruill.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2489\/revisions\/2492"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/markspruill.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2489"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/markspruill.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2489"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/markspruill.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2489"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}