June 10, 2009

Listening to
the sprinklers on Starla's lawn
Watching
the grape vines grow
Soaking up
the warmth of the morning sun
Tasting
life.

Lord, give me the grace, wisdom, and courage to approach this worship guide project in a way that will glorify you and edify this fledgling community. Keep my words simple and true and my motivations pure. I love you.

Time to reread C.S. Lewis' The Four Loves, and really think through the labyrinth of language and communication.

[This may look familiar. It turned into my very first "Setting the Stage."]

"We prepare to pray not by composing our prayers, but ourselves." (Peterson, Answering God)
Think about Step One of each of Keller's examples of meditation. It always begins with preparation. "Prepare ye the way of the Lord." A voice crying in the wilderness. Our daily lives have become a wilderness, and the tangled undergrowth of all the things we feel we NEED to accomplish trips up our feet, keeps us from the basic: Be still, and know that I am God. Wait upon the Lord. Then we can run and not grow weary. Why do we insist on running first?

If I can just get all this stuff done, cross these things off my list, make these elemental decisions, then maybe I'll have time to sit around and talk to God. What backwards lives we lead!

We need to live counterintuitively. Stop the madness. Prayer truly is ANSWERING GOD. Certainly not talking at Him, and not even really talking with Him. It is quieting our souls and interior monologues, shutting the hell up (including the voices in our heads) and listening to our Creator tell us how it's meant to be done. He will not abandon the works of His hands, and His steadfast love does endure forever. We just have to slow down enough to pay attention, to delight in the fact that He makes time for us. If anybody has a to-do list 87 miles long, it is the Lord of the Universe, and yet He makes time to know everything about us. Now there is a humbling thought. Who are we to insist on controlling our own lives?