"Love has the final move..."

"if paradise has
up and flown away for now,
but hope still breathes
and Truth is always true,
 just when we think
it's almost over,
Love has the final move..."

This summer has asked a lot of our humanity. I don't know about you, but I've slept little and questioned much. I can't help but wonder if Thomas Paine was just being historically accurate, or prophetically clear-eyed when he wrote: "These are the times that try men's souls." It certainly feels as if my soul - my spiritual senses -- have been deeply tried. Chris Rice's "Love Has the Final Move," soothed my heart one recent night as I lay in the dark praying for the world.

My prayers were not complex. They were not the unpacking of deep metaphysical premises. They didn't lead me to profound moments of realization. They were simple. "God, help me practice the two great commandments -- to love and trust You - supremely,  And to love my neighbor as myself."

But then my heart begged the age-old question: "But who is my neighbor?" And I remembered Jesus' answer to this question: the story of the good Samaritan. The neighbor was a stranger, a foreigner, someone whose customs and traditions were very different from those of the questioner. Well, I mused, no one could have more foreign ideas, customs, or rituals from my own, than an angry, torch-carrying neo-nazi, waving a swastika emblazoned flag, while spewing hateful rhetoric about racial supremacy. Yup, not my finest thinking.

"Dear God," I prayed, "please don't ask me to love them as myself." In other words, please don't ask me to love them in order to be my best self. But God said, "Isn't that what you have already been doing? Loving yourself in exact proportion to how you have been loving them." 

This wasn't going quite the way I'd expected.  But God persisted.  "You haven't been loving them, and you haven't been loving yourself very effectively. And since I am asking you to love them as you love yourself, it's important that you do that first.  But, you haven't been very kind to yourself. You have judged yourself based on your mistakes, your failures, your body fitness, your sense of being "less" in the world, your sense of what other people think of you."

He was right. It had been a hard summer. There were times when I'd felt awkward and small. I hadn't felt a clear sense of belonging. I felt like a square peg in a round hole. And I wasn't sure how something that had once felt so right, had come to feel so wrong. Had the square hole I'd thought I fit into -- so beautifully -- become round? Had I grown sharp edges, so that I no longer slipped effortlessly into the round, smooth hole?

Because I didn't know where I fit, I'd spent much of the summer holed up in my office, where I could focus on God -- letting my work singularly shape my sense of belonging.  It was wonderful, but I knew I couldn't stay sequestered forever.  The world was rightfully encroaching on my sublime isolation.  I had to find a way to expand my sense of loving others  -- as myself.  And this was much harder than I wanted it to be.

What I wanted was answers, I wanted a path to a solution, I wanted a way out of my own too-tight skin. Suddenly the conflicts and chaos I was praying about in far-away  Charlottesville, were really much, much closer. A small, awkward version of me was marching round the memorial I'd erected, and chanting in my head, "you will not replace us." Threatening the "me" that longed for a larger, more expansive sense of what it meant to love my neighbor as myself. It was no longer enough to feel good with (and about) those I shared a common hope -- my neighborhood was expanding.

So I held a rally within myself. The kind of rally I wanted to see happening in Charlottesville, Boston, San Francisco, and in my own community. I realized I needed to listen -- and to listen deeply, and attentively. All the doubts, hurt, fears, confusion, and anger needed to be seen, heard, and thoughtfully addressed.  I needed to lay down my weapons of self-certainty and be willing to hear something new.

For example, I had been feeling like I was no longer relevant - in my children's lives, in my friendships, in communities that I loved. 

First, I listened to the self-pitying logic that wanted to claim justification for this feeling. And then I was quiet. Really, really quiet.  I didn't just jump all over it with a slew of metaphysical quotes. I calmly looked at each of the suggestions and asked myself questions like: "Is this true? How do you know that it's true? Is it possible that it's not true? What would things look like if you didn't believe it were true? And if it is true, what are you willing to do to change it?"

I was respectful and considerate. I was not dismissive or reactive. I committed to loving myself.  Really loving myself.  Not only the me that I knew was the reflection of God, but I loved the me that felt buffeted by self-doubt.  The shift was remarkable. I wasn't afraid of my feelings. They were just feelings, they weren't necessarily facts. I could question them without feeling attacked for being less spiritual or less metaphysically "on top of it."

And more importantly, I felt real love for others the minute I started loving myself. I felt love for the journey that had brought me to this very moment of willingness, of deep self-examination.  I belonged here.  I was ready to grow from it.  And I was not alone in the uncertainty of it all.  

I also felt a genuine love for the girl in me -- the teen, woman, wife, mom, friend, healer, neighbor who had navigated this journey with courage -- day after day.  She'd made mistakes, but she was also bravely confronting those mistakes with humility and acceptance.  She was learning from those mistakes and that was all God was asking of her.

And in this loving of myself and my journey -- as full of missteps and blunders as it was -- I was able to love my neighbor and his/her journey -- no matter how little I understood of its history or its trajectory.  Regardless of how much I might not agree with the reasoning or decisions that got them there.  

Their journey was not mine to judge. It could only serve as an opportunity for me to learn to love more unconditionally.  I could learn to nurture my best self, by loving my neighbor -- regardless of the script, costume, props, or story that the ego was offering as right or wrong -- for either of us.  I could know that Love was/is working Her purpose out in every one of us.  

I began to see, I could trust that no matter how far gone the game seemed to be, Love would always have the final move -- in my life, in my neighbor's life, in my community, and in the world.  Love would always win.


offered with Love,

Kate

"cast - deep, deep within..."

"deep enough to reach out
and touch the face of
the One who made me.
and oh, the love I feel.."

Chris Rice's "Deep Enough," is the song that reminds me of last summer's ephiphany. But I am getting ahead of myself.

It began early that spring. I knew that I was going to have the privilege of supporting Adventure Unlimited's summer staff during their three weeks of pre-camp training school. I eagerly awaited the email that would announce that year's metaphysical theme. When it came, I felt -- ambivalent. Of course I was familiar with the Scripture from John:

"Cast the net
on the right side
of the ship,
and ye shall find."  

I'd read it many times. I'd trusted it, wrestled with it, and I'd pondered its relevancy. But all last spring it left me feeling flat. I didn't like the right vs. wrong -- or even the right vs. left -- connotations. I was uncomfortable with there being a right side at all. It implied a wrong side. And if there was a wrong side, what was it's genesis. Certainly not God. And if not God -- who or what. And if there really was a who or what, didn't that also imply a creator other than God. You see where I'm going -- right?

Now, all this wrestling could have remained very private, except for one small thing. I was supposed to deliver an inspirational talk on the first day of training school centered on that Scriptural theme.  Hmmm -- what to do?  Of course, pray.  

So, in the weeks, and days -- and hours -- before the start of training camp, I was on my knees asking God for inspiration, clarity, a fresh perspective. Because clearly, the one I was harboring wasn't cutting it. And I couldn't fake it. It would be impossible for me to speak about this Scripture - in a winning way - if I wasn't inspired myself.

Driving up the camp road that morning, I had nothing. Really -- nothing. I was driving with my heart in my throat -- and figuratively, on my knees. "Dear God," I thought, "please help." It was that simple. Please help. And it was like the clouds parted within my heart, and I was flooded with this simple message. "What if the way you are looking at this question, 'what is the 'right side?' -- is just another a version of 'lo, here, or lo, there?" What if it has nothing to do with right or left, right or wrong, here or there, this or that.  What if the spiritual "side" is the inside -- vs. the outside.

In less time than it took me to finish my drive from the "Y" in the road, to Round Up -- less than two minutes at 20 miles per hour. The entire message was written on my heart. God had been preparing it - in me - for years. It was His love that had helped me see -- even as a little girl -- that "the gospel of the kingdom," was the the good news of Jesus' message about the kingdom, as it is recorded in Luke. In this account, he is demanded of the Pharisees, when the kingdom of God should come, and he replies:

"the kingdom of God
cometh not with observation:
neither shall the say,
lo here! or, lo there!
for, behold,
the kingdom of God,
is within you." 

Even as a child this brought me such a sense of spiritual comfort and authority in navigating my own life.  I didn't need to find the right role model, the right book, the right teacher, the right school.  Whatever I needed to know, I would ultimately find within.  

Every answer I was seeking, the divine nudge I longed to feel, every comforting, healing, transforming thought comes from within. This is where God reigns. This is where God hold court and gives counsel. 

The books I read, the conversations I have, the inspirations that are shared with me -- they all point within. They guide me to that place of deeper oneness with divine Love. They encourage me to nurture a deeper sense of trust in the I AM that is always found within.  This trust is all that I will have eternally.  And this trust is the evidence of my wholeness -- my health. 

For me, this "inside" is the side -- the only side -- where I need to cast my questions, cares, and concerns. This is where I will find all that I am searching, longing, yearning for. This is the place of deep stillness where I hear the voice of the only One who can truly affirm the All-in-allness of Truth, the eternality of Life, the infinitude of Love -- His Love.

From that moment on, this Scripture became my touchstone all summer. In fact, it still is. When I am casting about for direction, answers, comfort, inspiration -- I am reminded to turn to the kingdom within. This is where I will find the eternal, the enduring, the infinite. This is the place I can never leave, the kingdom where I will always be welcome.  

Here, within this kingdom, dwells a Sovereign who is tireless in His love for me, and mine, and all. This is where I can touch the face of the One who made me for the sheer purpose of loving and trusting Him.

May you cast all your care upon Him, for He careth for you...



offered with Love,

Kate

[photo credit: Ian Forber-Pratt]

"all I have needed...."

"all I have needed
Thy hand hath provided.
Great is Thy faithfulness,
Lord unto me..."

There are songs that feed my soul when I am sad, or lonely, or just feeling a bit disconnected from my best self. This afternoon, it was Chris Rice's version of "Great is Thy Faithfulness." I wasn't searching for it -- it was just there. Like a reminder. Like a prayer.

I would like to think that I am immune to the way that others treat me, those I love, and those I have yet to meet -- locally and globally. But I think, that at least for me, this would signal my ascension -- the ultimate dissolution of the ego. I am obviously not there. But every day I seek the grace to let the opinions and actions of others inform me less. I am discovering that this grace is, truly, all that I need.

I've never felt this need more clearly. It has breathed new life into a favorite passage from Mary Baker Eddy's Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures:

"What we most need, is the prayer
of fervent desire for growth in grace,
expressed in patience, meekness, love,
and good deeds."  

Yes, this grace is what I most need. But, it is also already what I most desire -- fervently.

Over the years I have written about healings I have experienced. About character traits transformed. About physical challenges overcome. About financial needs met. But, it is this wrestling match with the ego that continues to give me a run for my spiritual money. 

Why am I ever surprised by this? Isn't this what would keep us from feeling the spiritual freedom we ultimately seek? The ego -- which is never personal -- is simply that false sense of being. One which constantly asserts that we are separate entities from the one Source of all existence -- God.

The ego says, "You are special. You started from unique circumstances -- good, bad, privileged, doomed. You have the opportunity to either exploit this personal good, or overcome the unfortunate circumstances of your life. You can change it all. You are self-determined and self-created. You are the master of your own destiny. Now, mortal, go make something great of yourself -- or screw it up royally.  It's all up to you."

But this kind of thinking can also lead to self-blame, feelings of inadequacy, failure, victimization. "If only I..."

Where is God in either of these equations? The Divine is relegated to a help meet -- serving our self-determined, or self-condemning, agendas. This God is neither omnipotent, nor omniscient. This Deity needs our consent -- our spiritual buy-in -- to have any power. This not-so-all-knowing, knows only what we tell Him we want or need. This God is not the Source of our being, but the biased arbiter of our success or failure.

This is what the ego presents -- a self-determined mortal on the treadmill of his/her own design. And it is a treadmill that will never stop turning. Churning out endless scenarios of self. One minute a self that achieves, the next minute a self that can be deceived or deceiving. One day a testimony of healing, the next a nightmare of pain.  In one scene a confident spiritual healer, the next a fragile ego on the brink of tears.

Our only hope is grace. Grace, among other definitions, is the "unmerited and unearned favor of God." Ahhh -- this is where a fathomless peace lies. Not in our own efforts, but in an effortless trust in His/Her faithfulness -- in the unconditional and impartial nature of Love -- a love that is not personally circumscribed, but universally giving. A love like the sun -- that shines on the dandelion, as brightly as on the rose.

Tonight, I am leaning into that grace. I am kicking the ego out of its hiding place -- under a thin-skinned mortal sense of self. I am trusting Love to be impartial -- to pour It's grace upon us all - to refresh and renew every heart in the healing waters of God's all-presence.

offered with Love,

Kate

"Will there ever be a place where I belong..."

"Fatherless and nameless still,
fallen heart and broken -
will there ever be a place
where I belong..."

I was ten, and as broken inside as a child could be. At four I was given a name I'd never heard myself called before, and was told that one of the people I thought loved me most -- didn't.  I was told that I would never see him again. No explanation, just new name, new dad, new home.

Can you spell devastation? I couldn't, but I knew it's color, tone, and temperature. The only thing that mitigated the reach of it's cold horror, was my little sister. She was my hope. She was the thread of belonging that kept me alive to myself.

When I first heard Chris Rice's "Belong" a few years ago, I couldn't listen to it. It was too hard. I wanted to stay here -- in the light of who I am today. But the other day a friend posted a link to "Belong" on Facebook, and I knew I had to write this piece.

As a little girl I had only brief flashes of God. As a toddler, my aunt and uncle took me to Sunday School whenever I visited them.  And during my darkest hours I would remember walking from their church to the town bakery for crumb buns.

I loved watching the powdered sugar falling on my black patent-leather shoes as we made our way along the cobbled sidewalk -- one hand in hers, one wrapped around my pastry. Those Sundays stayed with me, not because of the sweets, but because I associated those memories with a feeling of belonging to the "something bigger than myself," I was learning about in Sunday School.

My grandmother would also take me to Sunday School when I visited her.  Afterwards, we'd return to the her yellow bungalow on a shady street.  We'd eat our lunch on the sun porch and then water the African violets that covered every window sill in her sunny kitchen. I associated caring for plants with home, and a sense of belonging to something safe, sure, and alive with beauty.

When my family moved far away from both my aunt and grandmother, I gathered those memories of belonging close to my heart, and tried to share them with my sister in every way I could. We moved often, but she and I always shared a bed and dreams of home. I always knew that I belonged to her, and with her.

There were many dark nights when I would curl myself around her, and silently recount all the ways that we were whole. We had our mother's love, our growing family of siblings, but most importantly, we had each other. We were smart and creative -- we liked to draw and dance; she was very strong, and I could read faster than anyone we knew. I could spell and she was the best runner -- ever.

Then one day everything changed. Our parents started going to church -- the same kind of church that my grandmother and aunt had taken me to as a toddler. Our younger siblings were going to Sunday School with us and we were became part of a community of people who believed that God was real, people were good, and Love heals. It was a whole new world for us.

My sister and I were not really as alone and vulnerable as I had long-feared. I didn't have to be afraid that someday we might have to fend for ourselves in a dark, cold world -- one where loved ones could disappear in the breath of a moment. We had God and He loved us. He had all the power in the universe, and he knew our every thought. He wanted only good for us. We would be okay.

One day, in Sunday School, my teacher read a sentence from Mary Baker Eddy's Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures.  It said, in part:

"...the author has often remembered
our Master’s love for little children,
and understood how truly such as they
belong to the heavenly kingdom."

That may seem like "just a sentence" to some readers, but to me -- as a child who wasn't even sure who she was anymore -- it was a "place" I could cling to -- it was where my sister and I really belonged.   It was a place in time and eternity that no one could take from us.

Now, I won't say that this sense of belonging was always easy to remember. Over the years I've struggled mightily with suggestions of rejection, abandonment, feeling untethered and homeless. But always, right around the corner, was the memory of belonging to a "heavenly kingdom" where the Master loves his little children.

And if you are thinking, "I don't really know anyone who feels like that..." Don't be so sure. I was not a waif. My clothes were always clean, my mother loved me, and I was surrounded by siblings I adored. But I was starving for this sense of belonging -- to know that I was not a random piece of human fluff, tossed indiscriminately by the winds of chance and circumstance.

Today, as I navigate each moment's responsibilities, decisions, and appointments -- being a neighbor, mom, volunteer, wife, daughter, sister, colleague -- I try to remember that just because someone seems to "have it all together," doesn't mean they aren't hungry for that same sense of belonging I was so desperate to feel. There is nothing more wonderful than knowing you belong to a broader spiritual community -- a family of Love -- warm, all-inclusive, impartial, and universal.  This is the kingdom of heaven, and it exists within us all -- regardless of socio-economics, religion, culture, race, or gender.   In this kingdom, we are united to one another as siblings of one common Parent.

It's a sense of belonging that even the most lonely person on earth has access to -- right this very second.

with love,

Kate

"Smell the Color 9..."

"I would take "no" for an answer
Just to know I heard You speak
And I'm wonderin' why I've never
Seen the signs they claim they see
Are the special revelations
Meant for everybody but me?
Maybe I don't truly know You
Or maybe I just simply believe…"
- Chris Rice

It was cold, cloudy and drippingly gray on the Cape that afternoon.  The small church seated less than 50 in its auditorium. By the time we arrived for the talk they were seating overflow guests in the Sunday School down the hall. 

I was distracted and I don't think I had ever felt so empty.  There wasn't a "reason," I couldn't put my finger on a cause.  It just felt as if all the light and inspiration had drained out of some spigot in the bottom of my big toe and I didn't know how to get it back. 

We had moved to Boston earlier that year to serve an organization we loved.  When we considered making the move from the comfort of our small university town in Colorado, it was easy to feel inspired and courageous, selfless and willing.  But once we got there and discovered that our commute was going to be about an hour and a half each way, and our work schedules were not in synch, and that I would find the tasks in my job menial and mind-numbing…well, we were not such happy campers.   All those noble motives and ideals seemed to pale in the actual light of a 15-hour work day…door to door.

The further I indulged my sense of disappointment, the less inspired I became.  What was I thinking...accepting a job as a file clerk when I had been a school principal?  Didn 't this organization realize how over-qualified I was?  Was I crazy to think that the mission of the office--and the materials I would be responsible for--would overshadow my sense of personal achievement and  job status?  Before long I was feeling an emptiness so hollow that I could hear the echo of every complaint reverberating through me like an out of tune bell.

I didn't want to feel this way.  I longed for the kind of quiet satisfaction I had felt when I'd hungered so desperately to make a difference in the world.  The kind of longing that had led me to Boston and to be willing to do the work I had accepted.   But I couldn't seem to find the heartbeat of that Soul-animated lifeforce which had impelled me to consider a life of selfless service.   The more I felt for it and was met with a cold, pulse-less silence…the more I wanted it.  And the more I wanted it, the less my work satisfied me.   It felt cyclical and bleak…and yet I still found myself waking each morning with this glimmer of hope that today some spark of inspiration would catch fire in me and reignite the passion for living with a spiritual purpose that had brought me there.  I just wanted to feel God in my life.  I wanted to hear some message of "good and faithful servant," to sense some small indication that I was on the right track with Him.

"'...Cause I can sniff, I can see
And I can count up pretty high
But these faculties aren't getting me
Any closer to the sky
But my heart of faith keeps poundin'
So I know I'm doin' fine
But sometimes finding You
Is just like trying to
Smell the color nine..."

That weekend had been particularly desolate.  I had brought work home with me and I couldn't even make myself open the manilla file folders stacked at my elbow.  I had spent hours sitting at the kitchen table looking out the window at the gray-green water lapping at the shoreline while cup after cup of untouched tea cooled in front of me.

When a friend at church suggested that we drive further down the Cape for an inspirational talk by the sister of a friend, I was really quite indifferent.  "Sure…why not…at least I will have an excuse for why I never touched those files," I thought.

But once we arrived I was thinking this was even worse.  At least at home I would be in my jammies, I could have my tea, and if I got really miserable I could turn on the TV and watch an old movie. 

Sitting in the cold Sunday School to hear a talk being given in another room seemed torturous.  It is hard enough to concentrate when the speaker is standing in front of you, but sitting in hard chairs without anything to look at except the wrinkled collar on the blue and white striped oxford cloth shirt worn by the guy sitting in front of me...was agony.  I really hoped something would penetrate my coldness, but my optimism was fading fast.  I decided I would listen for just one word or phrase I could take home with me.  I reached for an old magazine that was on the "give away" table near my chair by the door, and found a pen in my jacket pocket.  During the first 30 minutes of the talk I doodled away on the back cover of the magazine filling in all but one small square that I reserved for that one poignant message. 

When it came I was not expecting it…really.  I had been listening intently and nothing was getting through.  I felt as if I was hearing her words from under water when suddenly as clear as a bell I heard the phrase, "infinitely near."   That was it.  Infinitely near.  In thinking of God as infinite, it was always something big and "out there."  But an infinitely near God's voice penetrated deep beneath the surface of mere hope and faith to a place of oneness, a space so intimate that I couldn't sense it…any more than I can feel my own heartbeat, or find my own pulse, or see my own talents.  

This phrase "infinitely near" became a space of rest for my hope.  I no longer needed a rest from my longing for God. I rested upon that longing as the promise that God was with me IN that longing.  In fact He was the source of it.  My desire to experience Him, to sense His presence was a sure indication that I knew what He felt like and wanted to go deeper.   That He had already penetrated my complacency and dug beneath the surface of my simple senses to the place where, as Chris Rice sings, "trying to find You is just like trying to smell the color nine."  You can't sense with the senses what is part of you. 

"... Now I've never 'felt the presence'
But I know You're always near
And I've never 'heard the calling'
But somehow You've led me right here
So I'm not looking for burning bushes
Or some divine graffiti to appear
I'm just beggin' You for some wisdom
And I believe You're puttin' some here

Smell the color nine?
But nine's not a color
And even if it were you can't smell a color
That's my point exactly..."

This phrase "infinitely near" has given me a peace that is "beyond understanding"…beyond feeling, and seeing, and tasting, and hearing and touching. It is  deeper than the ocean and higher than the sky, it is nearer than my heartbeat and further than I ever hope to reach.   I went back to work not inspired to be something--a title, a mission--but to live in consonance with that deeper pulse that was so infinitely near.  No matter what...this is the rhythm I dance to...this is the beat that drives me...this is the song that sings below the surface of the quiet..."infinitely near."

It is the smell of the color 9.

With love,
Kate

"Deep enough...to face a storm"

"Deep enough to dream
in brilliant colors I have never seen..."

In his song "Deep Enough to Dream,"   Chris Rice hones in on  an essential element of the work we all when we approach life from a prayer-based perspective. He sings of a rich depth of vision, a peace that he finds in the sacred space of prayer. It reminds me of the feeling I had as a girl one summer at the lake, where my aunt and uncle had rented a house for the season. 

My brothers, sisters, cousins and I would arrive early in the day to set up "camp".  We'd lay down our towels, staking out territory according to age and gender.  The older girls in one section, surrounded by books, magazines, bottles of baby oil that had been laced with iodine, cans of TAB, journals or diaries to write in,  and ryecrisp crackers.  

The boys (all in late grade school) were as far from us as we could convince them to be.  Their world was full of peanut butter and plastic things that blew up and could be floated on.  The littlest kids...toddlers and babies...were all near the moms, they were loud and full of sand and jelly. 

When I grew tired of all the noisy splashing I  would swim out as far as I was permitted.  At first I held my breath while floating on the surface.  But eventually I felt the noise from the shoreline penetrate my silence.  So I'd let out my breath, releasing the air that had kept me buoyed.  I then allowed my own body weight to take me under.  I descended well below the surface to find a peace so deep and impenetrable that I could actually feel the quiet. 

I did this over and over again.  Eventually I became so suffused with this deep peace that I could take it back to my towel on the beach.  Then I would actually be that island of quiet for myself that I was searching for. It allowed me to read Jane Austen’s  “Pride and Prejudice” without even hearing the splashing and screeching of a dozen infant to thirteen year olds. 

I was able to inhabit a world of Cotswold cottages and cobbled lanes, garden teas and diaphanous lawn dresses with my toes dug into the sand and my cousin just inches away sighing over the latest issue of Tiger Beat magazine.   Even today when I pray, I...as Rice sings...am able to use my memories, of how it felt to descend into the quiet of the lake, to take me:

"...Deep enough to reach out and touch
The face of the One who made me
And oh, the love I feel…”

Rice goes on to talk about what one sees in this place of deep peace. 

For me this “seeing” is not about taking in images and translating them into information that can be interpreted as reality.  It is about vision…about beholding…it is about seeing out from what God knows…and what I have the right to know as I reflect (think deeply about and ponder) Him, His nature, His All-in-allness as my life, in the universe... and as the only source of my reality.  (One of Webster’s definitions of reality that I cling to is “that which is actually occurring.”)

This beholding is often quite contrary to the images that are being presented as information to my “receptors”...eyes, ears…

But I have discovered that  a God-based, or spiritual sense of things is more about transmitting than reception.  I have the right to transmit or project this God-based vision…about anything or anyone…rather than feel imposed upon by images that are presented to me as reality...whether it relate to non-profit projects and initiatives I may have been invited to contribute ideas for, or the minutiae of everyday living.

I believe that it is this sense of vision that Mary Baker Eddy talks about when she relates:

“Jesus beheld in Science the perfect man,
who appeared to him where sinning mortal man
appears to mortals. 
In this perfect man the Saviour saw God's own likeness,
and this correct view of man healed the sick.
Thus Jesus taught that the kingdom of God is intact,
universal, and that man is pure and holy.”

Whether we are seeing out from this God-based sense of reality about man, family, government, the environment, or the weather…it is this vision-based sense of reality that we can begin to experience not only in the most simple details of our day, but on a global level.

I have had many opportunities to apply this kind of vision-based “beholding” over the last two decades, but I am reminded of one particularly clear example when I hear references in songs, poems or essays, to seeing or beholding “the face of God” as Rice does in his "Deep Enough to Dream".

In her biography of spiritual thought-leader and healer, Mary Baker Eddy, titled, Christian Healer, my good friend, Yvonne von Fettweiss, relates an experience shared in the memoirs of Adelaide Still,  one of the workers in Eddy’s household.  The account was profoundly helpful to me one summer afternoon some years ago.

I was the Christian Science practitioner on duty at a camp for teenagers who wanted to approach the adventure experience from a spiritual perspective.  One element of their two-week curriculum was a three-day outcamp trip. Some of the patrols were rafting the Arkansas River all day and sleeping under the stars on shore at night.  Other patrols were peaking 14,000-foot mountains or riding horses high into the canyons.  Each patrol would set up camp in the early evening, cook dinner, and then sleep in tents or under tarps. 

While these groups were out of camp I was often the only person on site.  My job was to spiritually support the harmony and safety of their trips and stay available should prayer-based care be needed for any of the counselors or campers during the trips. 

It was late afternoon on the day of trip departures and everyone was finally on their way.  The last patrol of horses and riders had clip-clopped their way past my cabin waving their goodbyes as they ascended a nearby trail.  I had eased myself into the Adirondack rocker on my front porch and let the quiet of an empty camp seep into my heart.  I looked to the east where I could see beyond Valerie Lake towards the Sleeping Indian range and miles of Colorado sky stretched before me like a canvas waiting for the paint of evening colors….pink, lavender and finally a deep velvety midnight blue…to wash across it. 

I was entranced with watching clouds drift into my view when suddenly I realized that those clouds were no longer puffy and white, or even heavy and gray.  They were black…black, angry thunderheads filled with rain and pierced every few moments from the far south with lightning. 

I was horrified that I had just let myself sit there and be mesmerized by the dramatic beauty of it all.  I didn’t have the luxury of watching a pretty mountain storm from the dry safety of my cabin perch.  I had campers out on the river, in the canyons and hiking through scree fields above treeline.  I was there for a purpose and it wasn’t to enjoy the scene being played out in front of me in Technicolor. 

For a split second I let my sense of guilt give me a good shaking.  Then I walked into my cabin and reached for something to give focus to my prayer.  The first thing I saw was Yvonne’s book.  My daughter had been assigned it as a summer Sunday School reading project and I had decided I would read it again with her, so had taken my copy to camp with me.  I knew that it was indexed, in part, according to healings witnessed.  I had remembered that there were among other things a reference or two that addressed storms.  I quickly came upon one of the references “Storm Dispelled” and went back onto the porch to read:

Adelaide Still reminisces:

“On several occasions I saw Mrs. Eddy dispel a storm; the first time was on August 3, 1907, in the late afternoon.  The sky was overcast and it was very dark.  Mrs. Eddy sat in her chair in the tower corner of her study, watching the clouds with a smile and a rapt expression on her face.  She seemed to be seeing something beyond her present surroundings, and I do not think that she was conscious of my presence.  In a few moments the clouds broke and flecked, and the storm was dissolved into its native nothingness.  About have an hour later I took her supper tray to her, and she said to me, “Ada, did you see the sky?”  I replied, “Yes, Mrs. Eddy.”  The she said, “It (meaning the cloud) never was;  God’s face was never clouded.”  This agrees with what another student has recorded as having been said by Mrs. Eddy, namely, “When I wanted to dispel a storm.  I did not say, ‘there is no thunder, and no lightning.’ But I said, ‘God’s face is there, and I do see it.’”

I decided that since spiritual laws are not personally or historically defined as true, but universally applicable…"if it was good enough for her…it was good enough for me".

I used my memories of exhaling and letting myself go deep beneath the surface at the lake…or as Eddy says in her how-to book on spiritual healing, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures:

“We must look deep into realism
instead of accepting only
the outward sense of things.”

I looked into the sky focusing on a tiny patch of blue that seemed to be in the process of being swallowed up by hostile black storm clouds.  I allowed myself to see this as the “face of God” expressed as clarity, light, and…vision.

I maintained that focus, and these focused prayers seemed to serve as a paintbrush washing beautifully colored thoughts about God as Mind...the only Mind... across the canvas of sky before me.  God was expressing Himself as clarity, light and wisdom...in the guidance that counselors were finding as they sought direction in leading campers on new trails...or as a whispered thought that calmed the horses who, through their silent gentleness, were themselves helping  novice campers find a sense of secure peace on their strong backs.  Mind was washing away any sense of disturbance with broad spiritual brushstrokes of peace and calm.  I had almost forgotten the storm when I realized that the sun was shining brightly onto the meadow in the foreground of my periphery. 

I was almost stunned.  I sat there with tears of realization running down my face.  I had seen the “face of God” and I felt as if “he was pleased with me”.

I will never forget the feeling of sitting on that porch for the rest of the evening...long after the last of the storm clouds had flecked and dissolved... and watching the sky go from blue to pink to salmon to lavender to a blanket of deep midnight blue velvet covered with diamonds.  Through each of those brilliant colors I was still seeing the face of God.

I love the sense of vision Chris Rice further brings to his lyrics:

"...'cause peace is pouring over my soul
See the lambs and the lions playin'
I join in and I drink the music
Holiness is the air I'm breathin'
My faithful heroes break the bread
And answer all of my questions
Not to mention what the streets are made of
My heart's held hostage by this love

And these brilliant colors I have never seen
I join a billion people for a wedding feast
And I reach out and touch the face of the One who made me
And oh, the love I feel, and oh the peace
Do I ever have to wake up?..."

I ask myself “Do I really ever have to wake up to a reality that isn’t God-based?”

No…I think I’ll stay out here in the middle of the lake looking up through the water to see the sun, God’s face, reaching through to touch me with light.

The water’s perfect…come on in…

Here is a video clip of Chris' song "Deep Enough to Dream"   it wasn't available when I first posted this piece...but now it is.  I hope you enjoy it.

with great love,

Kate
Kate Robertson, CS