Morning without you is a dwindled dawn. ~Emily Dickinsonin a letter to a friend April 1885
Over the years, the most common search term bringing new readers to my Barnstorming blog is “dwindled dawn.”
I had written about Emily Dickinson’s “dwindles” on a number of occasions – missing a house full of our three children, who have their own homes with families. Yet I had not felt afflicted with a serious case of dwindles myself until the ongoing isolation during COVID-time.
I was clearly not the only one. “Dwindles” spread across the globe during the pandemic more quickly than the virus.
There really isn’t a pill that works well for dwindling. One of the most effective treatments is breaking bread with friends and family all in the same room, at the same table, playing games, lingering over conversation or singing together in harmony.
Just being together becomes the ultimate cure for dwindles.
Maybe experiencing friend and family deficiency during the pandemic helped us all understand how crucial we are to one another. It’s high time to replenish the reservoir so we don’t dwindle away to nothing.
If you are visiting these words for the first time because you too searched for “dwindled dawn” — welcome to Barnstorming. We can stave off the dwindles by joining together each day for encouragement and a bit of beauty.
Because mornings without you all diminishes me. I just want you to know.
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Do you know why this world is as bad as it is? It is because people think only about their own business, and won’t trouble themselves to stand up for the oppressed, nor bring the wrong-doers to light. My doctrine is this: that if we see cruelty or wrong that we have the power to stop, and do nothing, we make ourselves sharers in the guilt. ~Anna Sewell from Black Beauty
We live in a time where the groaning need and dividedness of humankind is especially to be felt and recognized. Countless people are subjected to hatred, violence and oppression which go unchecked. The injustice and corruption which exist today are causing many voices to be raised to protest and cry out that something be done. Many men and women are being moved to sacrifice much in the struggle for justice, freedom, and peace. There is a movement afoot in our time, a movement which is growing, awakening.
We must recognize that we as individuals are to blame for every social injustice, every oppression, the downgrading of others and the injury that man does to man, whether personal or on a broader plane.… God must intervene with his spirit and his justice and his truth. The present misery, need, and decay must pass away and the new day of the Son of Man must dawn. This is the advent of God’s coming. ~Dwight Blough from the introduction to When the Time was Fulfilled (1965)
Be careful whom you choose to hate. The small and the vulnerable own a protection great enough, if you could but see it, to melt you into jelly. ~Leif Enger from Peace Like a River
A true revolution of values will soon cause us to question the fairness and justice of many of our past and present policies. On the one hand, we are called to play the good Samaritan on life’s roadside; but that will be only an initial act. One day the whole Jericho road must be transformed so that men and women will not be beaten and robbed as they make their journey through life. True compassion is more than flinging a coin to a beggar; it understands that an edifice that produces beggars needs restructuring. America, the richest and most powerful nation in the world, can well lead the way in this revolution of values. There is nothing, except a tragic death wish, to prevent us from reordering our priorities… ~Martin Luther King, Jr. from a speech April 4, 1967
As we walk this life, this Jericho Road together, we cannot pass by the brother, the sister, the child who lies dying in the ditch. We must stop and help.
By mere circumstances of our place of birth, it could be you or me there bleeding, beaten, abandoned until Someone, journeying along that road, comes looking for us, He who was sent to take our place, as Substitution so we can get up, be made whole again, and walk Home.
Maranatha.
The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. Instead of diminishing evil, it multiplies it. Through violence you may murder the liar, but you cannot murder the lie, nor establish the truth. Through violence you may murder the hater, but you do not murder hate. In fact, violence merely increases hate. So it goes. Returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that. Hate multiplies hate, violence multiplies violence, and toughness multiplies toughness in a descending spiral of destruction…. The chain reaction of evil — hate begetting hate, wars producing more wars — must be broken, or we shall be plunged into the dark abyss of annihilation. ~Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. from Strength to Love
Lyrics: At the edge of Jericho Road Beneath the street light’s yellow orange glow The feared and the fallen go In the way of predator and prey No one’s spared Because hate is too great a weight to bear
In a cage of shadows we meet Naked and bloodied in the street At the mercy, at the feet Of the way of predator and prey No one’s spared Because hate is too great a weight to bear
In the darkness on shattered pavement The better angels fade Blurred in slumber, murder by numbers Do you know my name? Do you know my name? I believe in you
Because everyone holds some part of the truth And now, I’m in your way Do we stay on Jericho Road, forever going nowhere Till hate is too great a weight to bear
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After this, Jesus and his disciples went out into the Judean countryside, where he spent some time with them, and baptized. Now John also was baptizing at Aenon near Salim, because there was plenty of water, and people were coming and being baptized. (This was before John was put in prison.) An argument developed between some of John’s disciples and a certain Jew over the matter of ceremonial washing.They came to John and said to him, “Rabbi, that man who was with you on the other side of the Jordan—the one you testified about—look, he is baptizing, and everyone is going to him.”
To this John replied, “A person can receive only what is given them from heaven. You yourselves can testify that I said, ‘I am not the Messiah but am sent ahead of him.’The bride belongs to the bridegroom. The friend who attends the bridegroom waits and listens for him, and is full of joy when he hears the bridegroom’s voice. That joy is mine, and it is now complete.He must become greater; I must become less.”
The one who comes from above is above all; the one who is from the earth belongs to the earth, and speaks as one from the earth. The one who comes from heaven is above all.He testifies to what he has seen and heard, but no one accepts his testimony.Whoever has accepted it has certified that God is truthful.For the one whom God has sent speaks the words of God, for God gives the Spirit without limit. The Father loves the Son and has placed everything in his hands. Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life, but whoever rejects the Son will not see life, for God’s wrath remains on them. John 3: 22-36
Christ with me, Christ before me, Christ behind me, Christ in me, Christ beneath me, Christ above me, Christ on my right, Christ on my left, Christ when I lie down, Christ when I sit down, Christ when I arise, Christ in the heart of every man who thinks of me, Christ in the mouth of everyone who speaks of me, Christ in every eye that sees me, Christ in every ear that hears me. ~St. Patrick
To come down and wear our skin is for you to know our frailty: our bruises and callouses, our sunburns and warts, our tears and our bleeding, our spasming backs, and toothaches.
To come down to pulse within our hearts, is for you to know our temptation for self-promotion, and our desire to fill our own emptiness before first loving and serving others.
To inhabit our souls you humbled yourself to pull together our millions of broken pieces, feeding us with yourself, your spirit becoming the adhesive to glue us back wholly, God loving us by becoming us, so we don’t simply crumble to dust.
I am reading slowly through the words in the Book of John over the next year. Once a week, I will invite you to “come and see” what those words might mean as we explore His promises together.
Humble and Human, willing to bend You are Fashioned of flesh and the fire of life, You are Not too proud to wear our skin To know this weary world we’re in Humble, humble Jesus
Humble in sorrow, You gladly carried Your cross Never refusing Your life to the weakest of us Not too proud to bear our sin To feel this brokenness we’re in Humble, humble Jesus
We bow our knees We must decrease You must increase We lift You high
Humble in greatness, born in the likeness of man Name above all names, holding our world in Your hands Not too proud to dwell with us, to live in us, to die for us Humble, humble Jesus
I arise today through the strength of heaven Light of sun, radiance of moon Splendor of fire, speed of lightning Swiftness of wind, depth of the sea Stability of earth, firmness of rock
I arise today through God’s strength to pilot me God’s eye to look before me God’s wisdom to guide me God’s way to lie before me God’s shield to protect me
From all who shall wish me ill Afar and a-near Alone and in a multitude Against every cruel, merciless power That may oppose my body and soul
Christ with me, Christ before me Christ behind me, Christ in me Christ beneath me, Christ above me Christ on my right, Christ on my left Christ when I lie down, Christ when I sit down Christ when I arise, Christ to shield me
Christ in the heart of everyone who thinks of me Christ in the mouth of everyone who speaks of me
I arise today. ~St. Patrick’s Breastplate
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How can I feel so warm Here in the dead center of January? I can Scarcely believe it, and yet I have to, this is The only life I have. ~James Wright from “A Winter Daybreak above Vence”
to the northwestto the north
To-day I shall be strong, No more shall yield to wrong, Shall squander life no more; Days lost, I know not how, I shall retrieve them now; Now I shall keep the vow I never kept before. Ensanguining the skies How heavily it dies Into the west away; Past touch and sight and sound Not further to be found, How hopeless under ground Falls the remorseful day. ~A.E. Houseman from “How Clear, How Lovely Bright”
to the northeastto the eastto the southeast
It was like a church to me. I entered it on soft foot, Breath held like a cap in the hand. It was quiet. What God there was made himself felt, Not listened to, in clean colours That brought a moistening of the eye, In a movement of the wind over grass. There were no prayers said. But stillness Of the heart’s passions — that was praise Enough; and the mind’s cession Of its kingdom. I walked on, Simple and poor, while the air crumbled And broke on me generously as bread. ~R.S. Thomas “The Moor”
to the southto the southwest
So welcome in the dead center of January: a surround-sunset experience on our farm – 360 degrees of evolving color and patterns, streaks and swirls, gradation and gradual decline.
All is silent. No bird song, no wind, no spoken prayer. Yet communion takes place with the air breaking and feeding me like manna from heaven.
Witnessing the light bleeding out all around me:
I will squander my days no more, treasuring each as sheer gift. I will seek to serve my God, church, family, friends, and community. I will be warmed on this chilly winter day even as it descends to darkness, knowing light and hope will return.
to the westto the westto the west
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I dwell in Possibility – A fairer House than Prose – More numerous of Windows – Superior – for Doors –
Of Chambers as the Cedars – Impregnable of eye – And for an everlasting Roof The Gambrels of the Sky –
Of Visitors – the fairest – For Occupation – This – The spreading wide my narrow Hands To gather Paradise – ~Emily Dickinson
When I dwell in Emily D’s poetic possibilities, full of mysterious capitalizations, inscrutable dashes and sideways rhymes, I feel blinded, get easily lost, stumbling over this and that, and end up wondering where she is leading me and how far I’m willing to go.
Yet she tells me
– This – to get my attention, hold it fast, to look up and out, beyond, and into forever.
-This- is what I must do when I read her carefully chosen words and dashes
-This- is what I ask of a reader who opens my own words here
-This- is dwelling in possibility for a moment or an eternity, all eyes and windows and doors wide open to grasp a glimpse of Paradise.
-This- is our hands holding the seeds of potential for the future, to gather, to embrace, to pray, to prepare us for Whatever it is which Comes Next…
-This- we do it together…
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When it was almost time for the Jewish Passover, Jesus went up to Jerusalem. In the temple courts he found people selling cattle, sheep and doves, and others sitting at tables exchanging money. So he made a whip out of cords, and drove all from the temple courts, both sheep and cattle; he scattered the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables. To those who sold doves he said, “Get these out of here! Stop turning my Father’s house into a market!” His disciples remembered that it is written: “Zeal for your house will consume me.”
The Jews then responded to him, “What sign can you show us to prove your authority to do all this?”
Jesus answered them, “Destroy this temple, and I will raise it again in three days.”
They replied, “It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and you are going to raise it in three days?” But the temple he had spoken of was his body. After he was raised from the dead, his disciples recalled what he had said. Then they believed the scripture and the words that Jesus had spoken.
Now while he was in Jerusalem at the Passover Festival, many people saw the signs he was performing and believed in his name.But Jesus would not entrust himself to them, for he knew all people.He did not need any testimony about mankind, for he knew what was in each person. John 2:13-25
Come to your Temple here with liberation And overturn these tables of exchange Restore in me my lost imagination Begin in me for good, the pure change.
Come as you came, an infant with your mother, That innocence may cleanse and claim this ground Come as you came, a boy who sought his father With questions asked and certain answers found.
Come as you came this day, a man in anger Unleash the lash that drives a pathway through Face down for me the fear the shame the danger Teach me again to whom my love is due.
Break down in me the barricades of death And tear the veil in two with your last breath. ~Malcolm Guite “Cleansing of the Temple”
I come home from the soaring in which I lost myself. I was song, and the refrain which is God is still roaring in my ears.
Now I am still and plain: no more words. ~Rainer Marie Rilke from The Book of Hours I
Some days, words simply don’t come to me, feeling lost and empty.
I am stilled and plain until I feel a breath that scatters and overturns me.
God is in the depth of these dark hours.
He is here, a remaining seed, waiting, knowing and sowing me, helping me blossom again.
I am reading slowly through the words in the Book of John over the next year. Once a week, I will invite you to “come and see” what those words might mean as we explore His promises together.
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On the third day a wedding took place at Cana in Galilee. Jesus’ mother was there,and Jesus and his disciples had also been invited to the wedding. When the wine was gone, Jesus’ mother said to him, “They have no more wine.”
“Woman, why do you involve me?” Jesus replied. “My hour has not yet come.”
His mother said to the servants, “Do whatever he tells you.”
Nearby stood six stone water jars, the kind used by the Jews for ceremonial washing, each holding from twenty to thirty gallons.
Jesus said to the servants, “Fill the jars with water”; so they filled them to the brim.
Then he told them, “Now draw some out and take it to the master of the banquet.”
They did so, and the master of the banquet tasted the water that had been turned into wine. He did not realize where it had come from, though the servants who had drawn the water knew. Then he called the bridegroom asideand said, “Everyone brings out the choice wine first and then the cheaper wine after the guests have had too much to drink; but you have saved the best till now.”
What Jesus did here in Cana of Galilee was the first of the signs through which he revealed his glory; and his disciples believed in him.
After this he went down to Capernaum with his mother and brothers and his disciples. There they stayed for a few days. John 2: 1-12
St. John tells how, at Cana’s wedding feast, The water-pots poured wine in such amount That by his sober count There were a hundred gallons at the least.
It made no earthly sense, unless to show How whatsoever love elects to bless Brims to a sweet excess That can without depletion overflow.
Which is to say that what love sees is true; That this world’s fullness is not made but found. Life hungers to abound And pour its plenty out for such as you. ~Richard Wilbur from “A Wedding Toast”
In sleep his infant mouth works in and out. He is so new, his silk skin has not yet been roughed by plane and wooden beam nor, so far, has he had to deal with human doubt.
He is in a dream of nipple found, of blue-white milk, of curving skin and, pulsing in his ear, the inner throb of a warm heart’s repeated sound.
His only memories float from fluid space. So new he has not pounded nails, hung a door broken bread, felt rebuff, bent to the lash, wept for the sad heart of the human race. ~Luci Shaw “Kenosis”from Waiting on the Word
Experiencing the present purely is being emptied and hollow; you catch grace as a man fills his cup under a waterfall. ~Annie Dillard from Pilgrim at Tinker Creek
The world is filled, and filled with the Absolute.To see this is to be made free. ~Pierre Teilhard de Chardin from Hymn of the Universe
My mouth will utter praise of the Lord, of the Lord through whom all things have been made and who has been made amidst all things; who is the Revealer of His Father, Creator of His Mother; who is the Son of God from His Father without a mother, the Son of Man through His mother without a father.
He is as great as the Day of Angels, and as small as a day in the life of men; He is the Word of God before all ages, and the Word made flesh at the destined time. Maker of the sun, He is made beneath the sun.
In His Father He abides; from His mother He goes forth. Creator of heaven and earth, under the heavens He was born upon earth.
Wise beyond all speech, as a speechless child, He is wise. Filling the whole world, He lies in a manger. Ruling the stars, He nurses at His mother’s breast. He is great in the form of God and small in the form of a servant, so much so that His greatness is not diminished by His smallness, nor His smallness concealed by His greatness. ~St. Augustine from Exposition on Psalm 148
How empty was the world before Christ!
From Mary’s untouched womb to Joseph’s futile search for a place to sleep in Bethlehem, to the shepherds’ dismal existence on the hillsides, to Simeon’s arms aching to hold the Messiah, to Anna’s long wait in the temple, to the dregs left in the wedding casks of wine.
In a million ways, seen and unseen, the empty spaces are filled, the hunger sated, the thirst quenched, the rest assured. He joined with us in celebration so we shall never lack again.
He is wedded to us–all is fulfilled, someday to be filled fully.
I am reading slowly through the words in the Book of John over the next year or so. Each week, I will invite you to “come and see” what those words might mean as we explore His promises together.
My 2025 Advent theme: On the threshold between day and night
On that day there will be neither sunlight nor cold, frosty darkness. It will be a unique day—a day known only to the Lord— with no distinction between day and night. When evening comes, there will be light. Zechariah 14:6-7
So once in Israel love came to us incarnate, stood in the doorway between two worlds, and we were all afraid. ~Annie Dillard in Teaching a Stone to Talk
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Today is my mother’s birthday, but she’s not here to celebrate by opening a flowery card or looking calmly out a window.
If my mother were alive, she’d be 114 years old, and I am guessing neither of us would be enjoying her birthday very much.
Mother, I would love to see you again to take you shopping or to sit in your sunny apartment with a pot of tea, but it wouldn’t be the same at 114.
And I’m no prize either, almost 20 years older than the last time you saw me sitting by your deathbed. Some days, I look worse than yesterday’s oatmeal.
It must have been frigid that morning in the hour just before dawn on your first December 1st at the family farm a hundred miles north of Toronto.
Happy Birthday, anyway. Happy Birthday to you. ~Billy Collins from “December 1”
My mom meeting grandson Noah shortly before her death
December 1st is not my mother’s birthday but it was her death day seventeen years ago.
Yet it felt a bit like a birth.
The call came from the care center about 5:30 AM on the Monday after Thanksgiving on a frozen morning: the nurse gently said her breathing had changed, it wasn’t long now until she’d be gone.
My daughter and I quickly dressed and went out into bleak darkness to make the ten minute drive to where she lay. Mom had been wearily existing since a femur fracture 9 months earlier on a cruel April 1st morning. Everything changed for her at 87 years of being active. It was the beginning of the end for her, unable to care for herself at home.
Those nine months had been her gestation time to cross the threshold into a new life. It occurred to me as I drove – she was about to be born into her long-awaited yet long-feared transition to death.
Her room was darkened except for the multicolored lights on the table top artificial Christmas tree I had brought her a few days earlier. It cast colorful shadows onto the walls and the white bedspread on her hospital bed. It even made her look like she had color to her cheeks where there actually was none.
There was no one home.
She had already left, flown away while we drove the few miles to come to her. There was no reaching her now. Her skin was cooling, her face hollowed by the lack of effort, her body stilled and sunken.
I could not weep at that point – it was her liminal time to leave us behind. She was so very tired, so very weary, so very ready for heaven. And I, weary too, felt much like yesterday’s oatmeal, something she actually very much loved during her life, cooking up a big batch a couple times a week, enough to last several days.
I knew, seeing what was left of her there in that bed, Mom was no longer settling for yesterday’s oatmeal and no longer homeless. I knew she now was present for an everlasting feast, would never suffer insomnia again, would no longer be fearful of dying, her cheeks forever full of color.
I knew she had a new beginning: the glory of rebirth thanks to her Savior who had gently taken her by the hand through heaven’s gate to a land where joy would never end.
Happy Birthday, Mom. Happy December 1st Birthday to you.
I’ll fly away, oh glory I’ll fly away in the morning When I die hallelujah by and by I’ll fly away
God makes us happy as only children can be happy. God wants to always be with us, wherever we may be – in our sin, in our suffering and death. We are no longer alone; God is with us. We are no longer homeless; a bit of the eternal home itself has moved unto us. ~Dietrich Bonhoeffer
My 2025 Advent theme: On the threshold between heaven and earth
On that day there will be neither sunlight nor cold, frosty darkness. It will be a unique day—a day known only to the Lord— with no distinction between day and night. When evening comes, there will be light. Zechariah 14:6-7
So once in Israel love came to us incarnate, stood in the doorway between two worlds, and we were all afraid. ~Annie Dillard in Teaching a Stone to Talk
O Earth, lie heavily upon her eyes; Seal her sweet eyes weary of watching, Earth; Lie close around her; leave no room for mirth With its harsh laughter, nor for sound of sighs. She hath no questions, she hath no replies, Hushed in and curtained with a blessed dearth Of all that irked her from the hour of birth; With stillness that is almost Paradise. Darkness more clear than noon-day holdeth her, Silence more musical than any song; Even her very heart has ceased to stir: Until the morning of Eternity Her rest shall not begin nor end, but be; And when she wakes she will not think it long. ~Christina Rossetti “Rest”
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And this is the testimony of John, when the Jews sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem to ask him, “Who are you?” He confessed, and did not deny, but confessed, “I am not the Christ.”
And they asked him, “What then? Are you Elijah?” He said, “I am not.” “Are you the Prophet?” And he answered, “No.” So they said to him, “Who are you? We need to give an answer to those who sent us. What do you say about yourself?” He said, “I am the voice of one crying out in the wilderness, ‘Make straight the way of the Lord,’ as the prophet Isaiah said.”
(Now they had been sent from the Pharisees.) They asked him, “Then why are you baptizing, if you are neither the Christ, nor Elijah, nor the Prophet?”
John answered them, “I baptize with water, but among you stands one you do not know,even he who comes after me, the strap of whose sandal I am not worthy to untie.” These things took place in Bethany across the Jordan, where John was baptizing. John 1:19-28
We grow accustomed to the Dark — When Light is put away — As when the Neighbor holds the Lamp To witness her Good bye —
A Moment — We Uncertain step For newness of the night — Then — fit our Vision to the Dark — And meet the Road — erect —
And so of larger — Darknesses — Those Evenings of the Brain — When not a Moon disclose a sign — Or Star — come out — within —
The Bravest — grope a little — And sometimes hit a Tree Directly in the Forehead — But as they learn to see —
Either the Darkness alters — Or something in the sight Adjusts itself to Midnight — And Life steps almost straight. ~Emily Dickinson
I admit that I’ve been stumbling about in the dark, bearing the bruises and scrapes of random collisions with objects hidden in the night.
My eyes must slowly adjust to such bare illumination, as the Lamp sometimes is carried away. I must feel my way along the road of life.
I know there are fellow darkness travelers who also have lost their way and their Light, giving what they can and sometimes more.
And so, blinded as we each are, we run forehead-first into the Tree which has always been there and always will be.
Because of who we are and Who loves us, we, now free and forgiven, follow a darkened road guaranteed straight, all the way Home.
I am reading slowly through the words in the Book of John over the next year. Each week, I will invite you to “come and see” what those words might mean as we explore His promises together.
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There is a basic lesson that all young horses must learn (and a fewer older horses must relearn) on our farm. It is to stand still when asked and move only when asked. This does not come naturally to a young horse–they tend to be impatient and fidgety and fretful and full of energy. If they are hungry, they want food now and if they are bored, they want something different to do and if they are fearful, they want to be outta there.
Teaching a horse to be still is actually a greater lesson in persistence and consistency for the human handler, which means I don’t always do well in teaching this to my horses and they (and I) lapse frequently–wiggly pushy horses and a weary frustrated handler. It means correcting each little transgression the horse makes, asking them to move back to their original spot, even if there is hay waiting just beyond their nose, asking them to focus not on their hunger, their boredom, their fear, but asking them to focus only on me and where they are in relationship to me. It means they must forget about themselves and recognize something outside of themselves that is in control–even if I move away from them to do other things.
The greatest trust is when I can stand a horse in one spot, ask them to be still, walk away from them, briefly go out of sight, and return to find them as I left them, still focused on me even when I was not visible.
I was reminded of this during our pastor’s sermon on the book of Exodus when he preached on the moments before Moses parted the Red Sea, allowing the Hebrews an escape route away from Pharoah and the Egyptian chariots and soldiers. In those moments beforehand, the Hebrews were pressed up against the Sea with the Egyptians bearing down on them and they lamented they should never have left Egypt in the first place, and that generations of bondage in slavery would have been preferable to dying in the desert at the hands of the soldiers or drowning in the Sea.
Moses told them to “be still”. Or as our pastor said, he told them to “shut up”. Stay focused, be obedient, trust in the Lord’s plan. And the next thing that happened was the Sea opened up. Then the Hebrews rejoiced in thanksgiving for their freedom.
Thanksgiving, as it has developed over the years from the first historical observance of a meal shared jointly between the Pilgrims and their patient and generous Native American hosts, is just such a moment to “be still and know” about the gifts from our God. Yet in our hurried and harried culture, Thanksgiving is about buying the best bargain turkey, creating the most memorable recipes, decorating in perfect Martha Stewart style, eating together in Norman Rockwell style extended family gatherings, watching football and parades on the biggest flat screen TV, while preparing for the mad dash out the door the next day to start the Christmas shopping season.
Instead of all that fol de rol – be still.
Like my horses, I need correction when I start to agitate out of “hunger”–wanting to literally stuff myself full, or out of my boredom– seeking the latest in entertainment or satisfaction, or out of my fear– feeling the threats that surround us all in the world today. I need to be reminded continually that my focus must be outside myself and my perceived needs, and to be still long enough to know God is with us even though we cannot see Him every moment.
I do not do well at this.
My horses learn much faster than I do. I am restless, rarely taking the time to be still and acknowledge God who continually watches, waiting for me to settle down and focus on Him.
May this Thanksgiving remind me of my need for God, and my gratitude for His patient persistence in moving me back into place when I wiggle and fret and stuff myself even when I’m really not hungry.
May I remember that to be still and know God is the greatest gift I can give and that I can receive.
And may His Stillness be with you today as well.
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