A Thought About Prayer and Possibility… I would not describe it as a blinding light or even the proverbial cartoon lightbulb appearing above the head. I don’t want to make it more than what it was, but to dismiss it would feel disingenuous. This past week, I shared in a couple of prayer gatherings in our chapel – Tuesday evening and Wednesday afternoon. I won’t pretend to know if they meant anything to the others who participated. All I know is that Thursday morning I woke up with a different attitude. Since the flood, I have remained upbeat and relatively positive. Though a born optimist, there is a pragmatic part of me that can unknowingly slide into the valley of the spiritually vanquished. Like many of you, feeling overwhelmed and anxious by the list of “unknowns” and “the beyond our controls” can quickly eclipse optimism. Yet I found myself on Thursday morning with an optimism that was not rooted in traditional optimism. That may sound strange, but too often optimism is nothing more than wishful thinking that crumbles with the first wink of skepticism. I felt as if I had tapped into something that could loosely be described as a euphoric reassurance, a holy head rush, that left me feeling convicted. Could it have been the new dish I made with the spicy Muchi Curry? Maybe… but I would like to suggest something else. The flood was not God’s doing, but something of God’s using. We are being made anew – by water and Spirit. We are being reformed and reshaped as a community that is no longer trapped by a nostalgic vision of the past that conspired to dictate the future. Suddenly we find ourselves at a juncture that could be defined as either critical or creative. A critical juncture is what is seen by those who already see their situation as being in critical condition. What I perceived in those times of prayer was so full of life and promise that God was the only explanation. And when God is the explanation, it can only be assumed that buckling your seat belt and raising your hands in the air is the proper response. The ride has started, and where God will take us is limited only by God’s creativity. If you can’t tell, I woke up Thursday morning feeling excited.
SEE YOU IN WORSHIP
Continuing our discussion on gratitude.
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