Disturb Us

I stumbled accross this today. It intrigued me as I read so that I read with increasing attention and interest, fully expecting to see that the author was some peer or contemporary of ours who clearly understood exactly the unease that comes with familliarity and smooth sailing.

As I write this, I think of a brother who was just lamenting how tall the waves are where he is, and how dark the night. Hang on, brother, God wants to reveal Himself to you there. Your difficulty is no accident and your family are needy to see you boldly holding fast to what you know is true in the absence of so much as a ray from a distant lighthouse.

I myself am in choppy seas with gusty unpredictable winds. I have sought familliar shelter through rest, through dear friends, through worship... but they have not satisfied me. Perhaps now I know why. My Master repeats His invitation to Peter to me, "Come" (Matt 15:29). Not so that I learn to walk on water, Peter failed there too. But rather that I learn to look to the Master.

Disturb us, Lord, when

We are too well pleased with ourselves,

When our dreams have come true

Because we have dreamed too little,

When we arrived safely

Because we sailed too close to the shore.

Disturb us, Lord, when

With the abundance of things we possess

We have lost our thirst

For the waters of life;

Having fallen in love with life,

We have ceased to dream of eternity

And in our efforts to build a new earth,

We have allowed our vision

Of the new Heaven to dim.

Disturb us, Lord, to dare more boldly,

To venture on wider seas

Where storms will show your mastery;

Where losing sight of land,

We shall find the stars.

We ask You to push back

The horizons of our hopes;

And to push into the future

In strength, courage, hope, and love.

Sir Francis Drake - 1577

Where do you think we go when we die?

I happened accross an interesting forum this morning, asking "Where do you think we go when we die?" I responded after reading the first page or so of responses with the following:

The fact that the question troubles all humankind so deeply suggests that it is not a cultural, geographical or age related question. It is born out of who we are and where we come from. I as an engineer and a student of nature cannot believe that things got better and better without any train wrecks until the amoeba that crawled out of the primordial ooze finally became a human. The idea of an intelligent creator appeals to me and I find it to be consistent with all that I see around me.

The Bible claims to be the self revelation of that creator to his creation and as has been mentioned above, specifies that there are two eternal dwelling places, to one of which every person will eventually go. It also lays out a history of how this came to be and a path to get to heaven. Heaven is desireable to me because it is "good". Therfore, if everyone gets in, including the Hitlers... it doesn't seem like where I want to be.

I understand that the idea of reincarnation or just ceasing to exist is desireable at some level, because it takes away eternal responsability for your actions and decisions... but again I cannot fathom that it is possible to live like I want without consequence.

THEREFORE, I believe that everyone will go either to heaven or to hell and I hope that you will pursue heaven... I'd love to meet you there.

What do YOU think?

Wonderful to me!

Your comments both here and to my e mail are so encouraging and I love each of you (even the ones that don't respond!). So many of your names cross my lips as I thank God for the people he has used to bless my life.

segue About 6 months ago, I had a dream that a brother and sister in the Lord were expecting. I mentioned it to them at the time and we all chuckled about it and I completely forgot about it. So imagine my surprise when they called last week to say that they are expecting!

There is an old Jewish saying, "Man plans and God laughs" In this case, I think we're all having a good hearty laugh because what for SO long seemed impossible has turned out to my faithless eyes to be possible with God (just as He said it was all along). So my friends who've been married quite a while are now in the throws of re-arranging their lives and their house to make ready for this new gift of God.

Sometimes, these little things just tickle me and I wind up driving down the road or in the middle of something completely unrelated and suddenly laughing out loud and saying, "WOW, God, You are so wonderful to me!"