A Messy, Gooey, Awesome Kind of Life

“To love means loving the unlovable. To forgive means pardoning the unpardonable. Faith means believing the unbelievable. Hope means hoping when everything seems hopeless.”

― G.K. Chesterton

____________________________

life is messy

relationships are messy

love is messy

faith is messy

we always want it clean

easy

instant gratification seems lovely

most days

but instead we are stuck

with the messy kind of life

real life

the place where we live and breath

and have our being

is much like original oatmeal

difficult to get right

and when you are done

you have a hell of a

mess

you have to clean up

ah

but hooray for the sticky goodness

of a life that sticks to our

spiritual bones

and leaves us full

and

wanting

more

Trying too hard

“To have faith is to trust yourself to the water. When you swim you don't grab hold of the water, because if you do you will sink and drown. Instead you relax, and float.”

― Alan W. Watts

___________________________________

if I know anything about myself

and that is questionable

it is this

I usually try too hard

too hard to be liked

too hard to be helpful

to hard to be valued and respected

trying too hard often looks much

like not trying enough

or at other times

like being disorganized and scattered

this morning

as the blue sky stretched into eternity

and the green grass

of the pasture glowed neon

a mother cow stood the in middle of beauty

and voiced her lament

loud and repetitive

anxious

her frantic bleating shattering

the peace

a kindred soul

there are times when one must stop striving

breathe deep

and go with

the flow

The First Faint Gleam

“[To have Faith in Christ] means, of course, trying to do all that He says. There would be no sense in saying you trusted a person if you would not take his advice. Thus if you have really handed yourself over to Him, it must follow that you are trying to obey Him. But trying in a new way, a less worried way. Not doing these things in order to be saved, but because He has begun to save you already. Not hoping to get to Heaven as a reward for your actions, but inevitably wanting to act in a certain way because a first faint gleam of Heaven is already inside you.”

― C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity

________________________________________

“I am not a very good Christian”

how often I have heard those words

how often I have heard them echo down the corridors of my mind

such foolishness

what do we not understand about grace?

grace means

that the first faint gleam of the heaven

(or better yet the Kingdom)

Is already inside us

and as we find that light

deep

sometimes very deep

inside us

and nurture the flickering flame of the Spirit

it grows ever stronger

ever more visible

as we travel

the torturous way

home

_________________________

It only takes a spark, to get a fire going

And soon all those around, can warm up in its glowing…

                                                                Kurt Kaiser “Pass it On”  @ 1969