Day 24 – gratis pro deo, Free and For God

I sometimes dream of having enough money to be free to work as I wish. Then I wonder what I might do. It seems I am more inclined to recognize that which I would not do. I would not rush from one thing to the next; I would not drive my car as much; and I would not have one day the same as the last one. Many jobs seem to be a lot like the last one.

So what would I do? Lately, I’m drawn to cooking and gardening, simple tasks yet practical and earthy. I like to bicycle, walk and daydream. I wonder about school and how it might be changed so more young people would want to attend and would find success there. I read some and write some, mostly for my own edification. I think I’d go back to Africa and stay longer. I recently read on a t-shirt, “I need Africa more than Africa needs me.” There’s deep truth in that statement, enough to daydream about for months or years.

Do these activities leave me gratis pro deo? I not sure, but I’m certain that fulfillment is not about money but about smiles, fitness, digging in the dirt, and prayer.

Day 17 – The Dance

Capturing the right words as they run through my mind is like snatching confetti from the air during a Sounder’s game. Out of the thousands and thousands of little slips of colored paper, only a few dozen float close enough for me to even try to grab one. Then the puff of air created in my effort to pinch a piece pushes it even further from my grasp. Words can be that way too. I think I’ve got a good one only to find myself pushing it away in the effort to create a meaningful sentence.

Yet, my eyes are drawn skyward to watch confetti dance in the breeze. Rectangular slips lift and spin. Some fall quickly to rest motionless on the ground; others fly higher still and drift up and up, out of sight. I’m drawn to words on a page too. Sometimes my reading falls flat. My concentration wanes, and I seem to have read several pages unconsciously. The words float by like confetti, and none register meaning. Or I can stare off into space, a blank page before me under my pen, and hunt for ideas. Words drift past. Wisps of meaning are there like smoke lasting only for a moment. Only with discipline will I catch a few and begin to scribble them on the vacant page. One by one they whisk by, which ones will remain do so as a mysterious dance between pen tip and page.

The 365 day writing journey is a walk down this less traveled road. No clear roadmap exists. The path lies dim and misty twisting off into the unknown. All I can do is sit in front of the blank page, grasp the pen between thumb and forefinger and let the dance begin.

Day 14

“At its heart, the modern world is a decisive challenge to the authority of God . . . because our entire culture, Christians included, so relies on the gifts of the modern world that we have ‘no need of God’ in practice.” – Oz Guinness

We are deceived by the comforts that surround us. We are warm and dry in our homes; clean water flows freely from the faucet; and thousands of neatly kept rows of food in the supermarket down the street await our shopping cart. Even the term supermarket shouts our gluttonous consumption to the poor around us. We are deceived because we do not have the eyes to see the work of God in our midst nor the ears to hear His still small voice. We have no need of God because we already have everything we need.

Yet, God loves us none-the-less. When we leave home in search of the next level of success and fulfillment, we are really looking for acceptance and love. But we search were love cannot be found. According to Nouwen, the world says, “Yes, I love you if you are good-looking, intelligent and wealthy. I love you if you have a good education, a good job, and good connections. I love you if you produce much, sell much, and buy much. There are endless ‘ifs’ hidden in the world’s love. These ‘ifs’ enslave [us] . . . The world’s love is always conditional.”

So just as the prodigal son left home, we put on our finest clothes and drive away in our fancy cars to a distant land in a rebellious search for something that ironically is only found at home in the Father’s embrace. The great mystery is that the Father is always waiting with outstretched arms for our return.

Day 11 – Which Am I?

As Nouwen studied the painting he wondered which of the characters was operating in his life: the younger son – full of the excitement of an explorer, leaving home in search of his true identity, and yet squandering his money on loose living and having to return in shame to his father; the older son – faithful to his father and to the family farm, yet resenting his role and longing for the welcoming touch of his father; or the father – the one who receives others with grace and love, and whose role is to embrace the lost and comfort them.

At first glance, I see I have lived this past year as the prodigal son. I’ve lived freely without the constraints of a full time job. I’ve visited far off lands and people: New York City; the Sudan, Africa; and the Toronto area of Canada. At times I am haunted by the thought that I may have squandered resources of time and money without much of a result. I’ve wandered in and out of sink with God. I remember resting in the comfort of His embrace like the younger son and other times where I stood at a distance from Him, remaining aloof, feeling detached like the older son.

A few months ago I saw a t-shirt that said, “I need Africa more than Africa needs me.” That is one truth I have learned this year from visiting that multifarious land. It is a similar truth that I am relearning about God and from which I have drifted.

Day 9 – The Hermitage

I’m embarrassed to say that I was not more excited to come in from a sunny, crystal blue day and into the Hermitage in St. Petersburg. We’d already been in over a dozen museums on our trip to Russia so one more seemed like one too many. I did not realize that the corridors of the Hermitage contained some of the most famous works of art and that I could get almost close enough to press my nose against the canvas.

We only had a day to visit so we were taken on a two-hour, whirlwind tour and had the afternoon to revisit our favorite galleries. I was drawn back to the room containing several Rembrandt paintings: The Return of the Prodigal Son and The Crucifixion. For the better part of two hours I stood nearly motionless, breathless really, in front of these two masterpieces as if they were whispering to me stories I thought I already knew. Great groups of people would pass through the two-story room and then disperse leaving me alone with the paintings for minutes at a time. Now, three years later, the memories are flooding back as I read of a similar experience. Henri Nouwen also spent hours in the same room gazing at the prodigal son. I’m once again drawn to this author’s ability to bring such an honest look into the mysteries of a relationship with Christ.