Thursday, September 27, 2012

Dearest God,

I saved my favorite place to the last.  I had worked in the woods making a spiritual path to the altar but before that I had made side views, places where individuals could pause, reflect, meditate, or pray.  Today I started working on the ground in front of the tree struck by lightning some time back.  It is beautiful in its own way.  It points to heaven (if heaven is up) and there are all sorts of nooks and crannies where the eye can travel and find meaning.

But before I could plant, I had to dig up old roots and barbed wire that was sticking up out of the ground.  Thinking there was just one piece of wire, I began to pull but to no avail.  About three hours later I had about 30' of old rusty barbed wire.  During my work on hands and knees, I pulled, cut, dug, throwing dirt in every direction.  That was when a life lesson suddenly appeared.

A week or two ago when I laid out the spiritual path, I had made a stop by the altar.  There I created a stone cross on the ground.  The top stone pointed to the altar.  The second stone was shaped like a heart, the actual place of Christ's own heart.  The other stones filled in the sign of the cross.  But when I was fighting with the barbed wire, I realized the cross had gotten covered over, a couple of stones, the pointer and the heartstone, were actually pushed aside.  I stopped and thought about life, how our faith gets covered up by endless emotional debris and clutter and how there are some things that can threaten us even cut and wound us in the heart and mind.  When that happens our faith can waffle.  We can forget the relationship we share with you.  We can allow our hurt to disturb and unsettle us.  Or we can pause and take in our situation considering how faith can help us, how we can rely on your loving care, and move forward in strength and courage, joy, and peace.

Loving God,
you teach us
life lessons
all the time.
You point us
to truths
you want us
to know.
We are thankful;
I am thankful.

Love always, Andrea