Glory 06 - Layers

It was the end of today’s devotion that really stuck with me throughout the day. In writing about her experience of prayer flags that she had seen and then when some where given to her, she wrote these powerful and beautiful words:

I put the flags on my front porch, because they are meant to be outside, to be a welcoming mark. They are meant to bring something good, to create peace and grace. And when I see them, I am brought back to myself again, and back to all the voices that pray to God, and to Buddha, through the years, to those forces that call for benevolence and holiness and something sacred in the midst of a hectic life.

I just loved those words today - so much so that I needed to copy them and send them to my wife for when she woke up. My kids, some friends of ours, and me were at Mammoth Cave in Kentucky today for the day off. As those words continued to stick with me through the day, I felt them while we walked through the caves hundreds of feet below the surface. We saw the layers of rock and caverns that have been carved out by the impossibly slow work of water coming through. I feel that about prayer sometimes - that there are layers upon layers that we keep putting down as we pray. It builds us up and it builds others up. And sometimes we can see those layers and other times they are hidden from us. Yet, like the waters that carve the caves, so the Spirit moves and transforms those layers into something beautiful and wonderful.