reality moment

when we idealize our community

the fall from the sky of our ideal

into the pit of reality

can be crushing

simple moment

I am more and more convinced

that the times we struggle to "find" God

are because we are not simple enough

in our approaching Him

a pastor
a tired shepherd
a weary sojourner
with bloodied feet
from the States
has spent most of this week with me .......

he needed a hidden spot
to rest
to weep
to be seen
and be heard

he spoke of many things
but one statement ripped my heart to shreds ........

he has recently discovered
that while at seminary
he was raped of his intimacy with God
by religious theology .............

knowledge had become his lover

achieving position had displaced his passion

it was only as he dared to speak those words
the well of grief
and loss
and pain
and loneliness
was uncapped ...........

tremble moment

Thus says the LORD:
"Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool;
what is the house that you would build for me,
and what is the place of my rest?
All these things my hand has made,
and so all these things came to be,
declares the LORD.
But this is the one to whom I will look:
he who is humble
and contrite in spirit
and trembles at my word."
(Isaiah 66:1,2; ESV)

anorexic moment

The anorexic body

Have we become an anorexic body?

Do we see ourselves as spiritually fat when in fact we are wasting away?
Have we lost the taste for temple food after years of filling up on fast food?
Is the truth no longer palatable because it might offend?

Anorexia kills slowly

One by one internal organs quietly stop functioning
The heart slows and eventually stops
Lungs become deprived of oxygen
Life sustaining blood no longer flows throughout the body
Gangrene sets in
Members are rendered useless and require amputation

Anorexia kills silently

Whose mirror are we looking into
Whose reflection do we see
Whose reflection do we seek

Anorexia kills

Have we become an anorexic body?

love moments

At the end of Jesus' life,

he was stripped naked,

scourged at the pillar,

dehydrated,

and so poor

neither the earth nor the wood of the cross

offered Him a place to lay His head.

God was homeless.

Christ had nowhere to rest His head except His own shoulder.

That's because Jesus was drunk with love.

Catherine of Siena

fog moment

I know a man who lives in Paris.
His wife has Alzheimer's.
He was an important businessman--his life was filled with busyness.
But he said that when his wife fell sick, "I just could not put her in an institution, so I keep her.
I feed her. I bathe her."
I went to Paris to visit them
and this businessman who had been very busy all his life said,
"I have changed. I have become more human."
I got a letter from him recently.
He said that in the middle of the night his wife woke him up.
She came out of the fog for a moment, and she said,
"Darling, I just want to thank you for all you're doing for me."
Then she fell back into the fog.
He said, "I wept and I wept."
Jean Vanier