Posts Tagged prayer
rescued
Posted by annaldavis in Coffee, Everything Else on October 13, 2010
“I was with God and with the devil. And I reached out for God.” Mario Sepulveda, freed Chilean miner.
I’m currently sitting in a padded club chair at the back of my neighborhood Starbucks. There is a laptop computer nestled on my crossed legs (as my kids would say – “criss cross applesauce”) and a mostly empty tall house blend coffee on the round table beside me. I kicked off my flipflops some time ago and they are on the floor by my red purse, the smaller one that has forced me to cut down on what I carry around with me.
Clearly I have very little in common with the 33 miners in Chile who, as I type, are being pulled from their temporary home 2,000 feet below the earth’s surface. And yet as I read the story this morning on the web, I felt an immediate sense of identification with Sepulvada, the second miner to emerge. I was with God and with the devil. And I reached out for God.
I experience this feeling any time there is a big spiritual and/or emotional event in my life – usually when God is working to heal me and bring about some kind of rebirth in my heart. This kind of heart-work is always opposed, the enemy is always waiting in the wings to kill, steal, and destroy.
For example, last week I ran into someone from my past – someone I haven’t seen in at least 16 years and certainly didn’t expect to see while on a routine shopping trip to a nearby mall. After a brief and cordial exchange, I walked away to continue my shopping. That’s when the thoughts flew into my head – guilt-laden accusations and old negative “tapes” – a noisy din that grew increasingly louder. And then the still quiet, steady voice of Jesus – “that’s where you were. Because of Me you are no longer there, you are here with Me.”
I reached out for God then, in the midst of that noise when the devil accused me. I’m still reaching out, and my whole life is the story of His love bringing me to the surface. Back home to His Kingdom.
Let’s continue to pray for the miners as they adjust to life after this crisis. And may this event help us all to remember that our hearts have their own mine collapses, and to appreciate what Jesus has done – the depths to which He has gone – to free us.
Reach out for Him. The night is nearly over; the day is almost here (Romans 13:12).
brilliance
Posted by annaldavis in Everything Else on June 13, 2010
We went camping last week at some acreage we have out in West Texas, where my husband is building the cabin you see in the picture on the right. It’s a rugged piece of land, and the unique beauty found there goes hand-in-hand with regional dangers like rattlesnakes, cacti, wild boar, and blistering heat.
After sleeping in our cabin (now airtight enough to go without a tent!) we woke early to get our work done before the midday heat. By 10 am it had already become suffocating so we began packing up to go, squinting in the glare. There is nothing quite so bright as direct late-morning sun, with only small trees around so no shade.
The grass out there has been growing all spring and has become very tall, with beige seed pods at the top of each blade that bend over with the wind and shimmer in the brightness. I stopped packing for a few minutes to drink some water from the cooler and look out over the pasture. And that’s when it caught my eye — the shimmer and rhythm of the tall grass in the hot Texas breeze was almost hypnotizing. I could have watched it all day.
(God is like that, I think.)
Real life is both beautiful and dangerous, where metaphorical rock valleys hide rattlesnakes waiting to inject us with venom. Where the heat of midday suffocates us, bearing down relentlessly. Where obstacles like cactus and creatures like wild boars lurk underfoot or in our individual nights of the soul. Where hard work leaves us spent, staring out into a prairie of random thoughts and daydreams.
(God is the shimmer and the rhythm in the tall grass. Have you seen Him?)
what we don’t see
Posted by annaldavis in Everything Else on March 28, 2010
emotions. fear. joy. sorrow. elation. love.
When was the last time you saw LOVE? Or hate for that matter. Oh, we see actions that reflect love, hate, sadness. But we can’t see the thing itself, because it’s intangible. If we’re honest we see that most of the human experience is intangible. When we die there will be records of our lives — birth certificates, social security cards, marriage certificates, and death certificates. These are the tangible facts, but how deeply did we live, how did we love, what did we feel? These are the intangibles.
In our culture we are often wary of what we can’t see or quantify. And yet our most poignant moments are full of them and separate us from other animals. At the park the other day we saw a dead turtle floating in the pond, covered in moss and barely visible. No funeral procession, no mourning turtle-family, nothing. It probably saddened my children more than it did the other turtles.
The other day my daughter asked me why adults cry when they are happy. I didn’t really have an answer, but she came close to tears a few days later when re-united with her favorite stuffed friends. Emotions often take us by surprise. No human can deny their existence, at least no sane human.
And then there are other intangibles that are less comfortable to discuss. But all detectives know that what we don’t see holds the most significance.
angels. demons. heaven. hell. God. purpose. salvation. brokenness. evil. soul. Spirit.
What don’t you see?
