Faith's Channel Markers for the Spiritual Journey

Sometimes, I fear we drift about the sea of faith, not knowing for certain where we are going or have gone. How do we measure loving God with "all of our heart, soul, mind and strength?"

There are many willing to set buoys, marking religious channels for us to follow. Some offer us checklists for the voyage. It is all so simple, definable and settled. "Pray (instruct God about what God needs to do and how to do it), journal (in this $14.95 blank book with a cross on the cover), read scripture (from a specialized bible for 'grandmothers who crochet,' for 'teenagers who are cool' or for 'fishermen who have a bass boat,' or from one of roughly seven-hundred and sixty-seven other bibles) and all should be well."

I'm looking for channel markers of a different sort. For now, I've decided to look for some "fruit" the first missionary said will show up in my life if I'm intimate with God. Love, joy, peace, goodness, kindness, patience, faithfulness, gentleness and self control. (Galatians 5:22 & 23a) Although I can think of plenty of that fruit born from my living along the way, the baskets aren't really overflowing in my life right now. I need help. I'm going to the Source.

Yes I'll pray. I'll even pray some of my own words. But I'll also pray the prayer Jesus taught us, and The Jesus Prayer and others from saints through the ages. And I'll certainly pray using scripture, pleading from my barren heart for vital Life-giving nutrients to siphon their way up from the soil of faith and into my living. And I'll seek God's presence in candlelight, Gregorian chant on Pandora, hikes, scents, art and in the presence of other seekers. (You'll need to find your places.)

I'm looking for the Holy One, and choosing to join my sojourners in faith on the road marked before us. And hopefully, the breadcrumbs we leave behind will look a great deal like the handholds and footholds of those throughout history who have been desperate for the Holy....like fruit.

Lord have mercy, and grant us longing hearts.

Any markers of your own? Any places where you find the Holy about which you'd be willing to share? Please feel free to comment here.

Avoiding prayer for all worth: The Mystery Factor

I want to write a bit about mystery, and more specifically about God as mystery. Many of us dislike any sense of uncertainty or mystery when it comes to God. We want to be able to describe his ways perfectly. It is expected that with enough Bible Studies under our belt, we can move beyond mystery and into knowledge or certainty. People come to me asking very difficult theological questions, assuming that if one has studied long and hard enough, he can live beyond mystery--that she can give exacting answers to the most difficult of questions.

We want a definable God with definable ways.

Sorry to burst the bubble, but I'm afraid we don't have one of those.

When Abraham was called by God, he was invited to go to a place that he did not know. Abraham was invited into mysterious living. His calling wasn't to what he could see or understand, but into obedience in places and time when God would seem to make no sense. His marriage, his fatherhood, his role as an uncle and patriarch were in all ways confusing. Read his story in Genesis 12 and following, and tell me you think he perceived God as anything but mysterious.

But when we pray, we want to get right down to the facts. We will tell God how things are and then define the appropriate divine response. "Lord, you know so and so has these problems, and we ask you to take them away." We assume God will solve problems exactly as we imagine.

So when I repeat prayers in order to center myself in God's presence, those prayers are not of my own writing. They are however, very much from my heart and will. I pray, "Lord Jesus Christ, son of God, have mercy on me." for long periods of time, and then I come to the place where I feel comfortable switching to "Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on ___________." And in the blank I insert a person or situation or church or whatever.

In our western way of thinking, if we are not independent to pray what we want and how we want, then our prayers are not authentic. I disagree.

Often in our evangelical protestant way of thinking, if prayers are memorized, they must be only empty ritual. Again I disagree. And I do so because I believe that God is mystery, "his paths beyond searching out." And my task in prayer is not to instruct him, but to humbly place myself before him...as in the prayer above. Or as in the "Lord's Prayer," with its phrase: "Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven."

Thoughts?

(Over the past couple of weeks I have been silent here. Our family lost a dear loved one, and we spent most of two weeks in California. I apologize for the lack of attention to this site, however, obviously my heart and attentions were rightly placed elsewhere.)

Avoiding prayer for all we're worth: Tools Part 1

At the end of the last post, I promised that I would share some prayer tools with you. Because I find it hard to pray for more than a few seconds without losing focus, I have gone searching for these tools. Most people won't comment here, but I here via email and word of mouth that I am not alone in this struggle. And so, I will spend my next few posts striving to give you a few simple ideas and tools that may help you to pray.

(I believe that the best praying happens when we are together, praying as the church. I won't tackle that here, but will refer to it when I write about prayer books.)

For this first entry, I'll speak about place, posture/position and disposition.

Place
We need a place to pray where we can feel alone and uninhibited. We need to have a prayer place. Jesus spoke of "going to your closet" to pray. No matter the fancy definitions of "closet" we may read, the point is that we must have a private place to go and pray. I can't find that for you. You'll need to work on that. Examples might be a garage, a separate room in the house or at work. When my children were young, I used to sit in the room with them with my head under a blanket. They knew to leave me alone when I "went" there.

Posture/Position
I find that the posture, or position I take when I pray is important. I do not have any one single posture that I employ. However, I find that my body position is important. Why? We are not merely "spiritual" creatures. We are physical. God is saving us body and soul. There are times when I pray in my bed (the Psalmist speaks of this). There are times I kneel with my face up, and other times when my face is to the floor. There are times when I stand with my arms held in a receiving position, and other times when I sit quietly, with my hands cupped or folded on my lap.

These will make more sense when I go further into these elementary lessons.

So the first tools that I can give you, are to find a place and experiment with posture. I believe you will find it natural to know when to kneel, or sit or stand.

Disposition
Perhaps it is even more important to speak of disposition. There is nothing more important in the process of prayer than humility. Think of effective prayers in scripture--when people pleaded with Jesus--and you will be thinking of humble entreaties. The thief on the cross, the woman with the issue of blood, the blind man beside the road, the father who's son was thrown into fires by demons, the synagogue ruler who's daughter was at home dying--then dead. Desperate humility typifies those who pray effectively. We too must have God's blessing, and we pray best when we humbly seek it.

Hopefully tomorrow I'll have time to write some more specific prayer tools. If not then, I will in the next few days. I am excited to share some stuff that is really helping me. Today, I enjoyed a few hours of prayer. He is worthy of our pursuit!

Peace to you.

Avoiding prayer for all we're worth.

Have you ever tried to pray for more than a few moments? I know, for most people on this journey the answer is "yes." Yet often when we face the daunting silence of prayer, I fear we step away. We are probably convinced that the old saying is truly wise: "Don't just sit there. Do something!"

I am seeking to spend more time in praying. This has meant for me longer times of prayer. Here are the challenges I meet: Silence, a racing mind, and that incessant need to be busy doing. And because of these, I often avoid prayer for all I'm worth. And I become worth-less as a result.

Silence
Entering into quiet is frightening. Turning off all electronic forms of distraction leaves our souls feeling not only alone, but naked--exposed. And it is for this very reason that periods of silence are important to us. We need to see what is exposed. Is it loneliness? Is it fear? Is it anger? Is it resentment? Is it lust? What surfaces when you get quiet?

A Racing Mind
I don't like failure. And when I pray and my mind leaves the prayer behind and focuses on something else, it maddens me. It humiliates me. This causes me to believe that I simply am "not cut-out" to pray. That it is a gift that others can enjoy, rather than a skill that must be honed.

I'm learning to sit with my busy brain. When it wonders away, I pull it back to my prayer. And yes, I do this over and over and over again. I want to find my heart (what the Eastern Church calls the "nous"). And the longer I practice this corralling of my busy mind, the more I tame my soul.

That Incessant Need to Be Busy
I never have my "to do list" finished. I rarely get close. There are always more meetings to schedule and hold, more people to go and encourage and more studying to do for future teaching, etc. And so it is extremely difficult for me to still myself for the purpose of prayer. It is hard to stop and be present with God.

Prayer is a decision to step away from busy-ness. And while it is not practiced for the purpose of making us more effective in our work, it will do just that. When we sacrifice our busy-ness and choose prayer, we sharpen our soul which I will define here as our mind (our ability to think), our will (ability to make choices), and our emotions (our ability to feel).

TOOLS
I am discovering that the use of prayer tools can be helpful. I will write about them next time. Peace to you as you seek to honor the Lord of Holy Week.

An Unexpected Welcome: Retreating at Catholic retreat sites.

A gentle, smiling group gathers for simple fare at lunchtime. They have just completed noon prayers. Scriptures have been meditated upon, Psalms have been read and sung, and you have been prayed for. Yes you.

I've made it a habit to spend some time away with cloistered communities throughout my sojourn. I've visited them in deserts, mountains, in the sweltering south and in the Midwest. Each time, whether a community of nuns or priests, I find myself surrounded by welcome and peace. My spirit is invited to rest and pray.

In my book, The Runaway Pastor, the lead character visits a Catholic monastery for a time of prayer and reflection. The reason I chose not to mention a protestant one? I don't know of any. We don't have a similar long-standing monastic tradition. I encourage people of my congregation to go to such Catholic retreat facilities because there is no comparable place to go and pray within my tradition.

I've had a few critiques about this. "There are protestant campgrounds and retreat sites that welcome people to go on retreats," they say. "Why not go there?" And they are right, these places exist. But they are not the same. What one experiences in these cloistered communities I speak of is an atmosphere which has known continuous praying for the world and singing of the Psalms throughout the cycle of hours, days, weeks, months, years, decades and sometimes centuries or more. Prayer isn't retreated to for these people. It is their atmosphere...the air they breathe. This is the kind of holy place they share with us.

Yesterday for only two hours, I sat, shared stories, prayed and ate lunch with a Catholic sister whom I've known for twenty four years. Today is her eightieth birthday. Sixty seven of her years have been spent in community praying daily. And while she ventured out to teach school, serve in soup kitchens, jails, homeless shelters or as a speaker in retreat settings for literally thousands over the years; this sister has operated out of the strength drawn from roots deep in prayer and scripture--deep in God's presence. And yesterday, I enjoyed that place of peace and strength, and began a few days of vacation with prayer as my starting place.

You may not be aware of these places around you. Such communities are in countrysides and cities. And the people who find their home there work hard like you and I do. But they also have espoused themselves to prayer in community. And when they pray, they pray for you and your world. I would not want to see the world without such leaven.

Healing? Prayer? Real?

If I had another life to live, I might try to master mathematics so that I could study string and super-string physics. Reading around the edges of texts from these disciplines--as if reading a foreign language--I catch glimpses of tantalizing theories. Most fascinating of these are suggestions of interface between psycho-spiritual and space/time realities. I don't even know how to describe these adequately.

This week I thought about spiritual healing and the unexplained sense of a need to pray for someone, and how these things can happen over great physical distance. For instance: Have you ever heard of the parent who wakes in the night and just knows she needs to pray for her child--only to discover later that this was the exact moment of a crisis in the child's life? Have you ever been telephoned by a friend or relative, and before the phone rang, you picked it up to call them (and there was no obvious reason for the desire to call?) Have you known of someone that has been prayed for and then healed of a disease from which they should not have recovered? My answer to all of these questions is--"Yes."

How do these things happen?

Funny, it is not hard for me to believe that I can punch some buttons on my cell phone and speak with someone on the other side of the world. I can't explain how. I believe I can tune a radio in my car and listen to any sort of music or talk from distant cities. There are messages surrounding and saturating each of us as we look at this screen, and given the right tool, we can "tune" into them.

So why is it difficult to believe that I can pray (or care about or wish) for your well-being across miles or continental borders, and for you to be impacted physically? Can we truly "reach out and touch?"

Since I was a child, I've been taught to pray. I've been taught that I can speak to God and benefit another person or situation on the other side of the planet (i.e. praying for missionaries). But this feels somehow like a real stretch. I mean, effecting you from thousands of miles away is impossible, right? Why? Why can my phone vibrate in my pocket as a result of you calling me from far away, and I consider it commonplace? Why can I send this message into the wireless atmosphere of my living room, and feel it makes sense? How do I believe the television picture in front of me is simplistic--after it has been yanked from a satellite by a tiny dish on my roof?

Sometimes I think too much. But equally true is that sometimes I think we have very little faith in all things spiritual.

If you are interested in some research about the effect of prayer and well-wishing upon those in a distant place, check out the work of Elizabeth Targ. She is a bit controversial, and certainly doesn't intend to prove anything Christian. However, she has done some research that is tantalizing. I'll post a few of them for you.

http://www.uic.edu/classes/psych/psych242f/psch242spring2003/targ.htm

http://www.esalenctr.org/display/confpage.cfm?confid=8&pageid=74&pgtype=1

http://www.noetic.org/research/dh/research/DistantIntentionality.pdf

No time to edit here, so hope there aren't too many uglies in my typing.

A Season Alone

Where I live, October is tourist season. (Most locals have ceased sporting the bumper stickers "If it's tourist season, why can't we shoot them." After all, tourism makes my home town go, and I happen to be a fan of visitors--and plenty of'em.) But something spectacular happens on November 1.

We have a beautiful State Park boasting dozens of miles of horse, mountain bike and hiking trails. One can walk--and I have--all day and never cross the same place twice. From April through October, there are lots of people puffing along these paths. But Sunday, someone flipped a switch called "tradition," and the park emptied for the season. It is truly amazing.

Last week I stepped aside with regularity for visitors wanting to know "How much further to the lake." Yesterday I had the place to myself. The leaves crunching with my footfalls, the water chattering in the creek and the fleeing squirrels, rabbits and deer were the only sounds that met my ear. Suddenly I remembered that for the next several months, I have thousands of acres to myself. I'll smile and celebrate the remainder of fall--and all of winter--alone with my trekking poles, water filter and the steam rising from my sweat-soaked shirts.

I paused for a while on the last summit, waiting for the sun to drop behind a distant hill. A songbird added its lacy joy to the stillness. I'll be back again tonight or tomorrow afternoon at the latest. One can't afford to waste such glory.

What are you reveling in?

Human Touch, and Divine

There are joy-filled touches in human relationships. Hurts and joys felt so deeply, they threaten to undo us.

In a theater with family the other evening. My arm is around my wife, and my hand rests on the skin of her upper arm. The tenderness in that moment plowed through my soul with such force, I lost track of the movie, and time. I only wanted to feel and hold onto her and that fleeting instant.

Cradling my grand-daughter in my arms, then laying her in my lap and looking in her eyes. She begins to coo and speak with me. I speak and am quiet. She "speaks," then waits. Eventually, she wiggles her entire body trying to "say" what is in her. She smiles and I melt.

Sometimes when my children hurt or are sick, I'll hold them and tell them I'm leaking love into them. Or I'll say I'm soaking healing into them through my embrace. And I believe it.

What does love look like? I'm not always sure. But I know what it feels like. It stops time, it suspends my needs, it invokes deep passion for the better of the other.

I think of Jesus calling his Father, "Abba." The word is like our "Daddy," or "Papa." We are told the relationships within the Trinity are perfectly loving. I want to understand that. I want to believe that when I make my noises and wiggle with my fears and strive in my praying that somewhere, somehow God hears me and gets it. And then, I want to believe God begins to embrace and leak love into me...

Take peace in such hope.

Connecting

It's Tuesday night. This is the evening that my wife stays up north with my mother, between her Tuesday and Wednesday of work there. This is the night my daughter and her husband cook for me, and we enjoy some time together. And this is the night that, after hugs and good-byes, I am home alone.

After a Sunday of connecting and loving, I must be pretty intentional about down time. I need time to love and be loved by the Author of Love. I need to be recharged. But...

Isn't there just something addicting about connecting? We need human connections. Listen to the words I received in a recent email from an acquaintance:

As I took communion, I prayed, as always, that God's grace would cover the sins in my life. I sat back down, on the aisle, and wished that God could speak to me somehow and let me know he had not given up on me. Then, it happened. A tall, elderly lady in a turquoise dress walked down the aisle after taking communion. As far as I know, I have never seen her, nor she me. We did not make significant, if any, eye contact as she began to pass by me. As she passed me, however, she reached out her hand and laid it on my shoulder for a moment, in a gesture of tenderness and comfort, it seemed to me. I felt it was God's hand using her hand to tell me He is still there, loving me, pursuing me, waiting for me. It's one of those things that sounds so small, maybe, in the retelling, but I left church feeling that God had spoken to me personally, through the touch of that lady's hand.

Beautiful. The person and presence of Jesus offered through the touch of one of his own...who was sensitive enough to understand who needed Love's touch.

I can't get Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel's painting out of my mind right now...God's finger reaching and Adam's reaching and....CONTACT. I think I'll drop by facebook to see if there are any messages for me...

Where can you offer connection?

The Beatles/A Hymn/and A Sunday Morning Pastor

Before reading, please sing the Beatle's Eleanor Rigby. Done? Make sure the chorus is playing in your head... All the lonely people, where do they all come from? All the lonely people, where do they all belong? Ahhh, look at all the lonely people...(repeat last phrase.) So, are you with me now?

On Sunday mornings, I awake thinking of the day ahead. I rise earlier than most any morning of the week and go downstairs to my chair. I pray. I seek strength. I rehearse my sermon for the morning--sifting it through my spirit and hopefully a Greater One. And I feel alone.

Around the area where I live I know there are people, preparing to rendezvous with me at the "meeting place." (I always like that Quaker title better than "church.") I begin seeing their faces. There are parents who are hurting for sick or rebellious children. Elderly who are wondering if they can make it again ("Just hanging in there," I'll hear one say in another few hours). There are some couples struggling to stay faithful--or who have no idea their spouse is. There are teenagers doing life as if it feels like walking through deep oncoming water--or motor oil. There are single people wishing they were loved. There are people awaiting a diagnosis...cancer? There are children who will run to me for a hug. (God bless the children.)

And somehow in the strange way we do church, I will be a key to providing hope and healing to all of these.

I pray for the strength--the faith to perform.

I weep here alone in my chair, before anyone else gets up.

And I go to facebook hoping for a friend. One pastor after another has already been there, or drops-by while I am. Some mention sermon topics, others psych themselves up with a positive statement. And none of us comment on the others, or speak using the chat feature. We post no notes to each other. What can we say? We are storming the beaches today, and once again, we wonder if we'll survive.

Ah, look at all the lonely people
Ah, look at all the lonely people

Eleanor rigby picks up the rice in the church where a wedding has been
Lives in a dream
Waits at the window, wearing the face that she keeps in a jar by the door
Who is it for?

All the lonely people
Where do they all come from ?
All the lonely people
Where do they all belong ?

Father mckenzie writing the words of a sermon that no one will hear
No one comes near.
Look at him working. darning his socks in the night when there's nobody there
What does he care?

All the lonely people
Where do they all come from?
All the lonely people
Where do they all belong?

Eleanor rigby died in the church and was buried along with her name
Nobody came
Father mckenzie wiping the dirt from his hands as he walks from the grave
No one was saved

All the lonely people
Where do they all come from?
All the lonely people
Where do they all belong?
RECORDED BY THE BEATLES

And there is another text, this one by Edwin Hatch:
Breathe on me, Breath of God,
fill me with life anew,
that I may love what thou dost love,
and do what thou wouldst do.

Breathe on me, Breath of God,
until my heart is pure,
until with thee I will one will,
to do and to endure.

Breathe on me, Breath of God,
till I am wholly thine,
till all this earthly part of me
glows with thy fire divine.

AMEN

C.S. Lewis Poem: As the Ruin Falls

As the Ruin Falls

All this is flashy rhetoric about loving you.
I never had a selfless thought since I was born.
I am mercenary and self-seeking through and through:
I want God, you, all friends, merely to serve my turn.

Peace, re-assurance, pleasure, are the goals I seek,
I cannot crawl one inch outside my proper skin:
I talk of love --a scholar's parrot may talk Greek--
But, self-imprisoned, always end where I begin.

Only that now you have taught me (but how late) my lack.
I see the chasm. And everything you are was making
My heart into a bridge by which I might get back
From exile, and grow man. And now the bridge is breaking.

For this I bless you as the ruin falls. The pains
You give me are more precious than all other gains.

C.S. Lewis

Wow! Now that is poetry about the true human condition. Phil Keaggy recorded this to a hauntingly beautiful tune, and I learned it by heart as a result of the music when I was a teenager or college student. Good theology.

Grace and peace to you. I hope to post the first chapter of a new novel (Breakers) here within the next few days!

Scrapping Religion; Bringing Hope

I used to see self-denial as a bummer. A cruddy way to do life, but necessary none the less if I wanted to "make it" to heaven. Today, while the "way of the cross" is sometimes tough and requires sacrifice and discipline, I often find myself wanting to laugh my way toward Jerusalem.

For me, "self-denial" has always meant guilt about any personal gain or joy; it has looked like side-stepping pleasures and sins so that Icould end up in Heaven. Here is what that formula looks like:
The "cross way" of living=misery and self-denial now, in order to know pleasure someday.
(Just how far is that from the suicide-bomber's promise of virgins in paradise? And in our culture, which view of paradise wins?)

But for Jesus, the cross was always about liberation for OTHERS. Or:
The "cross way" of living = self denial in order to rescue and offer life to others.
And for Jesus, the Kingdom was present now, and later it would be an eternal blessing. Remember how he taught us to pray: Your (God's) Kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

How do these two views of self-denial play themselves in light of his Kingdom? A few examples:
I used to see littering as "bad." Now I long to see God's creation made pure and beautiful as my King wants it...the way God called it "good."

I used to see an "alcoholic" as disgusting; now I see a broken person needing loving rescue.

I used to avoid some movies because they might tempt me to be bad, or warp my sensitivities. Now I watch some darkness to understand the distance we've traveled from God's plan and hopes for us. And when I'm tempted by evil, I tell God, and ask for the strength to bring about God's loving reign with my living.

I usually thought of adultery as tempting, yet bad because it would damn me. Now I see the carnage it brings into the lives of husband and wife, children, and all who know and love them. Adultery is bad for the planet--the cosmos. It deals a blow to the Kingdom of God's love.

Church attendance used to be "have-to" thing in order to keep me preserved for heaven. Now, I recognize that God has designed his loving kingdom to restore all humanity and all creation, and that Kingdom renews creation only as God's people come together and then go to give and serve as "the person and presence of Jesus."

Devotions used to be something I did in order to stay good. Now, my devotion is to be the person and presence of Jesus in order to bring in his reign.

Denying myself now means sacrificing my own dominance, in order to join and facilitate the loving reign of Jesus the healer of all creation. His cross is my joy to carry, and sometimes suffer under. Today, my vision for the future is bigger than my own mansion in "glory." I dream of a world where my grandaughter's generation will know peace, wholeness and healing. Someone else finding their significance in God's present love and real world changing reign is a bigger deal to me.

Sweater Hugs

I got the greatest sweater for Christmas this year! It fits just right, and is made from a wool that is perfect--it breathes, yet keeps me warm. I've already worn it while hiking in the mountains and at my Sunday morning job. I've worn it for dressy stuff and to work in the wood pile. I love my new sweater.

Last April, Shelly started knitting it at my mother's home. I had no idea she was weaving me this love-gift for the better part of the year. But every time I put it on I remember. She has held it in her hands. She has stitched each fiber, and looped it together in just the right combinations of knitting and pearling (whatever that means) and now it is my most treasured inanimate companion.

I'm working in a coffee house away from home this morning. I've thought of many of you today. Your face has come before my mind for one reason or another. And as I've sensed the Presence, I've been asking (imagining is a better word) that you are enveloped in your creator's perfect fit. Kept warm near life's cold shoulders, safe from sharp edges, and yet free to move--plenty of room to breath.

Soak in your Life today, and why not weave a prayer of love for those in your circles.

Cozy.

Beginnings

Silence. Greeting the day with nothing. Ears strain, grasping for some sound out of the morning. No birdsong. Nothing. Only a shishing pulse in my head, counting down toward some next thing.

Be still... But junkie wants to reach for remote, for "On" button, for agitation. Junkie needs sound. Junkie wants entertained. Gulum-like insanity.

Breathe. Take in the silence. Listen beyond it for some better Word.

...and know that... Is there something to find in this nothing? Seeking, stretching, straining for stimulation. But no. All is quiet. Nothing in the emptiness.

Breathe. Be still.

Is there purpose in this new-day vacuum, where no expectations await me? ...i am not god.

The morning wood kicks into flame, ticking the stove and lighting its side of the room. From dark to light. From silence to crackling. From cool, to warming-heat.

O Life-giving mystery, teach me to pray beyond the static of the world. Tame my spirit so it longs for something beyond the inane teasings of this age. Hold me still long enough, that I tire of wiggling.

Sparks Flying

I remember when I was a kid, scooting my feet across carpet, and chasing my older sisters at the same time, in order to experience the joy of "shocking" them with the spark that would fly off of my finger, and into them. Flash! Out of no where, I was a source of light creating, electricity transferring energy!

During Advent, in these dark days, our church has been reading the longing scriptures of the season. "O that you would make the earth tremble." O how we want to see God do something, and when we are honest, there are at least days when we doubt his moving amongst us. Yet, week after week, as we read from Isaiah and the Psalms, from the Gospel and an epistle--we see that God is up to something.

It seems sad that those who received the assurances of God's coming in the prophets, never saw Jesus. In fact their great great grandchildren's great great grandchildren didn't see him! Think of it! All of their longing, and all of God's promising, did not enter their own reality?!

Must I always see the answers to my prayers in order to believe God is up to something? I want to pray--like so much scooting of my feet over carpet--and then see God at work. O God, give me faith to understand that I may not enjoy the answers to my prayers. That some future generation may reap blessings from my prayers, and not me. But in all things, keep my feet scooting across the carpets and my heart convinced that in some miraculous way, you are sending a shock-wave into some tomorrow.

Somehow I see Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel masterpiece showing God's finger and Adam's. Reaching, aren't we?...ever longing and reaching. As is God.

Well, I plan to post another section of the >Parable of the Gym this Saturday sometime. We have had some good conversations. Thanks to those bold enough to converse on-line. This next entry is a tough questioning of a lot I've given my life to.

Grace and peace to you, and keep the sparks flying!!