Easter Monday (on Thursday) - One Thing
(This was originally written on Monday but forgot to post it until today)
I think that the Spirit is trying to speak to me on this Easter Monday. This morning, I read in Psalm 27 (Message translation)
I'm asking God for one thing, only one thing: to live with God in God's house my whole life long. I'll contemplate God's beauty; I’ll study at God's feet. That's the only quiet, secure place in a noisy world, the perfect getaway, far from the buzz of traffic.
So, then the poem (Hope for the Here and now by Layton E Williams) today that I read based on Psalm 27 had this line at the end...
Still I believe in your goodness - yours - alive and well, here and now. I hang my tired hope on it.
And then this from an article on medium.com by Julio Vincent Gambuto (language warning in the article and in the quote below)
From one citizen to another, I beg of you: take a deep breath, ignore the deafening noise, and think deeply about what you want to put back into your life. This is our chance to define a new version of normal, a rare and truly sacred (yes, sacred) opportunity to get rid of the bullshit and to only bring back what works for us, what makes our lives richer, what makes our kids happier, what makes us truly proud.
Ok - so what am I hearing in this? I hear a message in these about what is most essential to focus upon, to dwell upon, to center my life upon. I love how Peterson translates that verse - to contemplate God’s beauty and study at God’s feet.
On Monday morning I saw a beautiful example of this. I was on a walk in our neighborhood when I saw this creation outside a house. Made from the rainbow of plastic bottle caps but also lifting up the words of hope we have in Jesus. This took a lot of work to do - collecting, putting together, writing, displaying - and it speaks in beautiful ways. It speaks of putting what God is doing in us out to others - we don’t just contemplate God’s beauty and study at God’s feet for what it does for us but instead how this message goes out to others.