Surprising Possibilities

Letter 4480

I saw no way to get from there to here. I was in a box canyon.

Yet opened a way I had not expected. Now I stand astride a high peak.

Now, how shall I return? I see no way from here to there.

❖

Let me be open to another unexpected way-opening.

This has happened before.

Consider:

Can I be open to surprising possibilities?

Reading:

❖ “It is perfectly true, as the philosophers say, that life must be understood backwards. But they forget the other proposition, that it must be lived forwards.” — Søren Kierkegaard, Journals, 1843

❖ “To come to the knowledge you have not you must go by a way in which you know not.” — John of the Cross, The Ascent of Mount Carmel

❖ “Behold, I will do a new thing; now it shall spring forth; shall ye not know it? I will even make a way in the wilderness, and rivers in the desert.” — Isaiah 43:19 (KJV)

Thank you for for reading. If this helped you today, please consider sharing it.

~B.R.

The Fence Line

Letter 4479

I have a neighbor.

Watching him repair a wall, I realized I did not know if his prior day had been heavy or light. We have occupied these lands side by side for years and my world has mostly been within my own fence line.

There is infinite sunshine; your kingdom’s arithmetic does not require decrease for another’s growth. Let me look less upon my own doings and take interest in my neighbor, and my neighbor’s neighbor.

❖

Let me wash others’ feet, one by one.

Consider:

Can I look up from my own occupations today?

Reading:

❖ “What do we live for, if it is not to make life less difficult to each other?” — George Eliot, Middlemarch

❖ “Community cannot feed for long on itself; it can only flourish where always the boundaries are giving way to the coming of others from beyond them — unknown and undiscovered brothers.” — Howard Thurman, The Search for Common Ground

❖ “Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others.” — Philippians 2:4 (KJV)

Thank you for for reading. If this helped you today, please consider sharing it.

~B.R.

The Great Stone

Letter 4478

There is a great stone set in a clearing near the edge of the village.

It serves so many functions: gathering spot, backdrop for an oration, shadow-caster on a hot day, play equipment as children clamber atop it.

❖

Is there anything to understand about this great stone, and how it does so much? Or shall we simply accept it and use it, each as we will?

Lord, let me accept the resources you have provided.

Consider:

Can I accept what is around me, without trying to understand it all?

Reading:

❖ “…capable of being in uncertainties, Mysteries, doubts, without any irritable reaching after fact and reason.” — John Keats, letter to George and Tom Keats, December 1817

❖ “The rose is without why; it blooms because it blooms, / It pays no attention to itself, asks not whether it is seen.” — Angelus Silesius, The Cherubinic Wanderer

❖ “The stone which the builders refused is become the head stone of the corner.” — Psalm 118:22 (KJV)

Thank you for for reading. If this helped you today, please consider sharing it.

~B.R.

Why and How

Letter 4477

As I walk and walk these lands — what drives me to do so?

As I daily devote these hours to you, Lord — what drives me?

It is not desperation that impels me to walk so far, nor grasping for something found at the end of the journey.

Nor is it mere habit that drives me to my front room each morning to think on you and write of what I find.

❖

You are never far, I need only draw near, or try to, and you lean back in my direction.

These are my devotions, Lord, which draw me near to you.

Let me draw near.

Consider:

Can I draw nearer to you today?

Reading:

❖ “Thou hast made us for thyself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it finds its rest in thee.” — Augustine, Confessions

❖ “We pursue God because, and only because, He has first put an urge within us that spurs us to the pursuit.” — A.W. Tozer, The Pursuit of God

❖ “Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you.” — James 4:8 (KJV)

Thank you for for reading. If this helped you today, please consider sharing it.

~B.R.