Home

It has taken most of this week, but this morning as I emerged from the bedroom in search of coffee and looked out over the mountains I felt a deep, inner sigh, a sigh of deep peace and contentment, the sigh of feeling at home, at rest. Brian McLaren, in his newest book, Naked Spirituality, deems this place the experience of "here," one of the early stages in the recurring spiral of spiritual growth, development, and experience. It is the re-realization of God's constant presence and the ensuing peace that such knowledge brings.
For me the experience of "here" is accompanied by a drive to do something. Much like the disciples of Jesus who experienced a mountaintop experience with him wanted to build an altar to commemorate the event, I want to get to work, prepping sermons or writing devotions or talking to students...but I know that what I need to do is rest in this moment, to allow God to minister to me as he did to Elijah (in the Old Testament story after the prophet had successfully battled the prophets of Baal). I need to stay in this place until the reality of God's abiding presence is firmly rooted in my conscience and until God moves me to the next place, like Elijah, with a deeper understanding of who God is and who I am in God's eyes.
And so I rest...and so I wait...and so I listen.