I've been feeling fried - overwhelmed, taking on too many people's stuff, exhausted; each day taking longer than the last to get momentum, passion, or energy. And I added to my schedule taking on several speaking engagements and a conference this month.
I go semi-regularly to the Bellingham healing prayer rooms because I need to receive prayer from places in addition to our ministry at Tierra Nueva. Last week I came in and found that someone had crafted a six foot cross and mounted it on the wall in the hallway of the prayer rooms and backlit it with rope lights. I placed my hand on the cross and it felt good. There was a physical sense of peace and rest - so I stayed there a while and eventually knelt.
As I was kneeling I found myself thinking about angels. What came to my mind was a picture of me kneeling and an angel draping a cloth over me, and another angel putting something on my lips.
When I got up to go into the waiting room, a woman approached me and said that there were angels in front of the cross and I had been kneeling in one. I stayed in the waiting room for a while and realized that the cross was a better place to wait so I went and sat at the foot. By the time I went in to receive prayer, I felt light and great.
I taught last weekend at a retreat near Mt. Rainier. These are often exhilarating and exhausting weekends, but this time I felt energized when I left. My time in the prayer room brought about a complete turn around for me.
Sometimes we can have experiences and not know what they mean or do or what to do with them. But this work of God has so clearly refreshed me, there is no other explanation for it.
I am reminded of a story from the Old Testament when the prophet Elijah is threatened by the queen Jezebel, he runs for his life and is ready to quit, even to the point of asking God to end his life. He lays down in an exhausted sleep and when he wakes there is an angel baking bread and offering him a jar of water. The angel says, "Arise and eat, for the journey is too much for you," and on the strength of the bread and water Elijah travels for 40 days.
Yeah, that's what was going on. Thank You God.
Friday, February 18, 2011
Too many Courtrooms
I sat in Whatcom County Superior Court waiting to see what would happen with the case of another friend of mine. Having met with him regularly in the jail and knowing he was going off to prison for his fifth time (he is 42 and has been in the system since he was 12), I felt a deep sense of futility about our work. Where is the lasting change? Where is real freedom and transformation?
And that is just one man. I sat in the courtroom and saw man after man come before the judge and felt overwhelmed by the needs and brokenness. In addition to these men are all those sitting around me who have as much need.
I thought about when Jesus looked at the crowds that were coming to him and had compassion on them because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. Maybe he was feeling overwhelmed, too. So he tells his disciples to pray to the Lord of the harvest and ask Him to send workers into the fields, because the harvest is plentiful and the workers are few.
So this is what I prayed a few weeks ago. And I realize that these people in this room are precisely the people Jesus spent his time with - he was called a friend of sinners and tax collectors. He didn't bring them into the synagogue; he went to their houses...
Rainier Marie Rilke writes in The Voices:
The rich do well to keep silent
for no one cares who or what they are.
But those in need must reveal themselves,
must say: I am blind
or: I am on the verge of going blind
or: nothing goes well with me on the earth...
or: I have a sickly child
or: I have little to hold me together...
And chances are that this is not nearly enough
And because people ignore them as they pass by
a thing; these unfortunates have to sing!
And at times one hears some excellent singing!
Of course, people differ in their tastes:
some would prefer to listen to choirs of boy-castrati
But God himself comes often and stays long
when the castrati's singing disturbs him.
And that is just one man. I sat in the courtroom and saw man after man come before the judge and felt overwhelmed by the needs and brokenness. In addition to these men are all those sitting around me who have as much need.
I thought about when Jesus looked at the crowds that were coming to him and had compassion on them because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. Maybe he was feeling overwhelmed, too. So he tells his disciples to pray to the Lord of the harvest and ask Him to send workers into the fields, because the harvest is plentiful and the workers are few.
So this is what I prayed a few weeks ago. And I realize that these people in this room are precisely the people Jesus spent his time with - he was called a friend of sinners and tax collectors. He didn't bring them into the synagogue; he went to their houses...
Rainier Marie Rilke writes in The Voices:
The rich do well to keep silent
for no one cares who or what they are.
But those in need must reveal themselves,
must say: I am blind
or: I am on the verge of going blind
or: nothing goes well with me on the earth...
or: I have a sickly child
or: I have little to hold me together...
And chances are that this is not nearly enough
And because people ignore them as they pass by
a thing; these unfortunates have to sing!
And at times one hears some excellent singing!
Of course, people differ in their tastes:
some would prefer to listen to choirs of boy-castrati
But God himself comes often and stays long
when the castrati's singing disturbs him.
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