The long and winding road

I dreamt last night of a curved, country road in Autumn. In my sleep the phrase "empty road" kept echoing in my mind, and for some reason I thought it was important that I remember that this wasn't a path of peaceful solitude, but one bereft of that...

It dawns on me as I write this, that the image I saw was an avatar of a young woman from the Ooze who has been struggling with depression. Perhaps I was being reminded to give more love and friendship to one whose road is empty.

Gentle Rain

God woke me up at 5am on a Wednesday morning, and I felt nudged to pray for my pastor who is handling the accidental cancellation of his medical insurance, maintenance chemo treatments, a week in a campground with his family between moving to a new house, and various and sundry pastoral responsibilities.

Dear Father,
In the crazy, busy, stressful
Torrents of churning life,
In the storming downpours,
May you be a gentle rain,
A calming brook,
A deep and quiet river within us.
May your voice be a summer’s breeze,
A gentle lapping of waves
on the shores of our soul.
May you fill our hearts with peace
Like the whisper of wind
Caressing the meadow grass,
Like the cricket’s song welcoming twilight.
Amen.

In Memory

My sister and I flew down to Florida when my mother died two years ago. One day looking through her old photo albums I ran across this picture of her.

Michigan State College Graduation - 26 July 1946
She died 57 years later to the day.

Rest in peace, my mother.

Masterpiece

My writing/reading for our 7/23 gathering, based on Ephesians 2:10:
"For we are God's masterpiece."

Somehow we manage to soil
With our thoughts
The canvas of our soul.
Forgetfully, unknowingly
We add pigments,
Painting ourselves with fear,
Coating a layer of hopelessness,
Sketching ourselves with the mud of the world.

Wash our soul-canvas, Lord,
Soak us in your grace.
Let us feel each brush stroke of
Your love upon our hearts.
Return us, replenish us,
Restore us, remind us
That we are your workmanship,
Your artistry,
Your cherished ones.
Beloved, we are your masterpiece.

God Breath

God breath
brush my cheek
with your kiss,
bend the branches
of my soul,
dance into my heart
your God wind.
Rush in, rush in.

God flame
stir the embers
of my spirit,
illumine me
with love,
sear my heart
with passion.
Burn deep, burn deep.

God breath,
be in me a swirling tempest.
God flame,
be in me a roaring fire.
Consume me, O consume me,
I pray.

Hunger at a Picnic

I think we had the bad luck of picking the hottest day of the year for our church picnic recently. Kelly, my Floridian daughter, was home visiting for a week, and she came with Carman and me to share a meal with my church family after our Sunday service. I was busy doing my usual graphic artist thing by taking pictures for our church web site. I was also trying to pay attention to those who seemed kind of off by themselves. Jessica sat alone at a table most of the time I was there, and I told her that I wanted to talk to her soon, as we haven't had a lot of conversation lately. And I know her life has been so hard.

But it wasn't until a couple days later that I realized how alone my daughter felt when we were there. I can see that in this picture I quickly shot of her. She's almost giving me a polite smile, but I caught her in real mode.

I felt sad when she told me later that she tried to engage people by smiling and making eye contact, and it didn't work. I felt sad when she told me that one young woman made kind of a rude comment to something she said. Lee had just given a spiritual talk about being God-saturated, and here we were isolating ourselves from others. How I wish our mutual faith in Christ would transform us all into family that reaches out and embraces others with the passion that early Christ followers must have felt, or the passion that Christians who worshiped in countries where our faith was forbidden must have had.

I tried to think of a practical solution from event planning experience, but that wasn't any good. The only thing I could do was write this prayer:

Dear Father

We ask you to bless this food
And to bless those without enough sustenance,
Whether they need nourishment for their bodies,
or the bread of friendship for their souls.

We thank you for this chance to share a meal together.
We pray that you will open our hearts and remind us that
We are all your children and all family.
Coax us to share a smile with a stranger.
Encourage us to say a kind word.
Nudge us to strike up a conversation with someone
We’ve never talked to before.

Help us this day to share our food and our selves,
As your Son did with so many of us, at so many tables.

Amen

2 Timothy 1:7

'For God has not given us the spirit of fear, but of power and love and a sound mind.'

This has been my mantra as a single mother. When I walked in to work one day only to be told that they had to lay me off because of financial problems, I burst into tears, wondering how I was going to support my family. A week later, my landlord told me I had 30 days to move out of the apartment I'd lived in for five years because he wanted it for his daughter.

I talked about this in church today, while we had a panel of moms on stage, a la "The View" - talking about the challenges of being mothers in our culture, and how our faith helps shape us.

After I told about how I used to use that scripture to help alleviate some of the fears I went through as a single mother, I talked about how the more I stay in the presence of God, the more fear doesn't reach me, the more I feel that peace beyond explanation.

But I went home from church knowing I had no money left in my checkbook or savings account until payday next Sunday. Yesterday I felt at peace, knowing I had my emergency Pepsi bottle bank filled part way with coins. I filled a ziploc bag full of them and Carman and I went to the store and poured them into the coin machine and then bought groceries - and left with $1.40 in cash.

So there's food, lots of food, and I'm grateful. But I felt rather like a charlatan after church because I've felt depressed since then, and nervous about making it to Friday. One minute I am so strong in feeling my connection to God and at peace with whatever comes. The next minute I'm depressed and feeling like God is far, far away.

But I'm back to thanking God. We'll make it. And he'll still be there loving me, even when I stumble away from him in my humanness.