Well, maybe so.  But it wasn't that way around here recently.

     One morning in October my wife showed me some scarves she had hanging in the closet.  They had been chewed up by a mouse.  So I decided I should find where the mouse came into the closet and close the hole before more damage was done.

     I was busy with other things until mid-morning, when I decided to look in the closet.  When I opened the door I was staring eyeball to eyeball with a mouse on top of the clothes hangers.  The rest of the day was filled with activity I had not planned, but which had to be done because there was a mouse in the house.

     The bad thing to me was the timing.  I had decided the Lord wanted me to begin writing on "The Scribe", which needed to go in the mail.  And I had made up my mind that nothing was going to get in the way.  But there was a mouse in the house.  And I had to take care of that.

     The day was full and hectic.  I set traps and waited (no mouse).  I pulled clothes out and laid them across the bed.  I discovered a mouse nest on top of the clothes hangers at a little used end of the closet.  I discovered four (count 'em, four) little "meeces", one by one (ugh!).  I cut and nailed tin over the hole she used to get in.  I cleaned up the mess and put the clothes back in one hanger at a time (watching carefully for any more "meeces").  I set the trap again, and finally caught the mouse just before bedtime.  What a day!

     But in the midst of all the confusion and activity caused by the unexpected interruption of a mouse in the house, the Lord enabled me to write "That Dumb Coon" and the "Purely Personal" comments.  And the newsletter went out on time.

     Since then, "A Mouse in the House" has become a parable to me of the many interruptions in life.  So many times they come.  Sickness, financial reversals, family problems, job stresses, mechanical breakdowns, etc.  And we often let them divert us from the real purpose of our lives.  We use them as excuses for why we can't do the will of God.  Or why we quit reaching for the dream.  "There was a mouse in the house, you see.  So I couldn't or didn't."

     But when we have a strong sense of God's plan for our lives, and when we are willing to commit to the fulfillment of that purpose a day at a time, we discover all over again that God's grace is sufficient.  Even when there is a mouse in the house.