life: acoustic & amplified
poetry, quotes & thoughts about life
Archive for the category “Adventure”
friends with benches
Benches are special things aren’t they?
They themselves sit and rest, in the sun, in the shade, in the rain, in the snow, at three in the morning…
there to welcome whoever might pass by.
And for what purpose?
To give a soul a moment to rest, to look out, to think, to plan something, or to get over something.
And in their most special times, most special for these benches, are when two people meet and share themselves. Communicate and think more completely than they could or would if they were still walking.
Then after minutes or hours the people rise.
They are different forever because of those minutes, or hours.
Different in very minor ways most times I’m sure.
And at other times, profoundly changed.
They look back and the bench seems physically unchanged, but we know otherwise.
A person was there, moments after measurable warmth remains,
albeit slowly spreading out to be no longer measurable.
The world is different.
Relationships,
interconnections,
changes in perspective.
A reaffrimation of love in the broadest sense.
That maybe god did not make man in his image. That maybe man arrogantly makes god in his image.
God did not make only man,
and I don’t think everything else was made for only for man’s purpose.
Maybe what we find so beautiful and comforting is that nature,
the cosmos,
god,
free will,
the opportunities to do good or ignore other’s needs,
the choices to try and give more than we take,
or take all we can,
the always present capability to pursue happiness…
are all here as are we,
with a purpose we will always look for,
and never completely find,
and all of it as part of a whole incomprehensible to us.
Such joy possible just knowing we are so fortunate to be part of it.
God has no limits, none whatsoever.
On a bench,
realizing we are part of it all,
and always will be,
and sharing
that there is no necessity to understand it all.
– Sunny
Nine steps to transform yourself into a river
by Paulo Coelho on July 11, 2012
http://paulocoelhoblog.com/2012/07/11/be-like-a-river/
“A river never passes the same place twice,” says a philosopher. “Life is like a river,” says another philosopher, and we draw the conclusion that this is the metaphor that comes closest to the meaning of life. Consequently, it is always good to remember::
A] We are always doing things for the first time.While we move between our source (birth) to our destination (death), the landscape will always be new. We should face these novelties with joy, not with fear – because it is useless to fear what cannot be avoided. A river never stops running.
B] In a valley we walk slower. When everything around us becomes easier, the waters grow calm, we become more open, fuller and more generous.
C] Our banks are always fertile. Vegetation only grows where there is water. Whoever comes into contact with us needs to understand that we are there to give the thirsty something to drink.
D] Stones should be avoided. It is obvious that water is stronger than granite, but it takes time for this to happen. It is no good letting yourself be overcome by stronger obstacles, or trying to fight against them – that is a useless waste of energy. It is best to understand where the way out is, and then move forward.
E] Hollows call for patience. All of a sudden the river enters a sort of hole and stops running as joyfully as before. At such moments the only way out is to count on the help of time. When the right moment comes the hollow fills up and the water can flow ahead. In the place of the ugly, lifeless hole there now stands a lake that others can contemplate with joy.
F] We are one. We were born in a place that was meant for us, which will always keep us supplied with enough water so that when confronted with obstacles or depression we have the necessary patience or strength to move forward. We begin our course in a soft and fragile manner, where even a simple leaf can stop us. Nevertheless, as we respect the mystery of the source that gave us life, and trust in His eternal wisdom, little by little we gain all that we need to pursue our path.
G] Although we are one, soon we shall be many. As we travel on, the waters of other springs come closer, because that is the best path to follow. Then we are no longer just one, but many – and there comes a moment when we feel lost. However, as the Bible says, “all rivers flow to the sea.” It is impossible to remain in our solitude, no matter how romantic that may seem. When we accept the inevitable encounter with other springs, we eventually understand that this makes us much stronger, we get around obstacles or fill in the hollows in far less time and with greater ease.
H] We are a means of transportation. Of leaves, boats, ideas. May our waters always be generous, may be always be able to carry ahead everything or everyone that needs our help.
I] We are a source of inspiration. And so, let us leave the final words to the Brazilian poet, Manuel Bandeira:
“To be like a river that flows silent through the night, not fearing the darkness and reflecting any stars high in the sky.
And if the sky is filled with clouds, the clouds are water like the river, so without remorse reflect them too”
I am finally in Ohio!!! More tomorrow!
I am so thankful for this amazing trip I just took to Connecticut & Boston!!! Still driving! 3 more hours…
no need to worry
Storms will come, count on it.
Times may come when you feel God is asleep,
not taking care of you, protecting you.
“Don’t you care?” you will pray.
Of course God cares, but just isn’t worried. Not at all.
You see, you are perishing, my dear, bit by bit.
God won’t take that from you,
won’t come between you and the storm,
but will go through it with you.
Even as the waves of your fear
wrap their white knuckles around your boat
there he is, curled in the stern,
unworried, vulnerable, babylike, willing.
Do you think he’ll let it sink if he’s in it?
When Jesus, drenched with your life,
cries, “Peace, be still,”
who do you think he’s talking to?
The calm of a storm-free life
might indeed be, as the writer says,
a dead one.
And if this really is the last chapter of your life,
won’t you have had
exactly what both of you want the most—
to be together through it all?
Storms will come.
Peace, be still.
__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
http://www.unfoldinglight.net
living the dangerous life
Ann Voskamp’s words from yesterday’s blog strike me to the bone –
There is nothing safe about the Christ who rent the veins and the veil to save us — He is Divine and He is Dangerous and He is Detonating. He is no tame lion.
What did Randy Alcorn say and in the most Scriptural sense? “It’s dangerous faith in our untamed Savior that leads us to the joy we crave.”
And there is so much we don’t understand though we steep ourselves in the infallible Word, that can’t be domesticated and entirely deduced by finite minds in a world where He stretches out the north over the void and hangs the earth on nothing.
You can only be marked as safe if you’ve fashioned for yourself a God small and tame.
And what the world desperately needs is more dangerous disciples of an unsafe God.
John Piper had said it like that:
“I think it is virtually impossible to honestly say that knowing God, as God intends to be known by his people in the new covenant, simply means mental awareness or understanding or acquaintance with God.
Not in a million years is that what “knowing God” means here.
This is the knowing of a lover, not a scholar. A scholar can be a lover. But a scholar—or a pastor—doesn’t know God until he is a lover.
You can know about God by research; but until the researcher is ravished by what he sees, he doesn’t know God for who he really is.
And that is one great reason why many pastors can become so impure. They don’t know God—the true, massive, glorious, gracious, biblical God.
The humble intimacy and brokenhearted ecstasy—giving fire to the facts—is not there.” – John Piper
Until we’re ravished by what we see, we don’t really know who God is? Ravished? It sounds so — terribly uncomfortable and wholly dangerous.
But maybe that is the thing? Does God ever make His people comfortable and hasn’t He always called His disciples to the dangerous? To say the uncomfortable, to speak to an inappropriately erotic culture with purely redemptive language, to take back the language that’s been hijacked and tainted by a fallen and direly needful culture and use it to speak of His own startling, ravishing, holy metaphor….
The heart recovers as it keeps walking dangerously ahead.
A heart recovers as it embraces the inherent risks of living. God met Moses on a mountaintop. Who ever said climbing mountains was safe? Where are those who are willing to be dangerous disciples of the unsafe God who is the safest of all?
And a heart recovering, beating strong and stronger –
It can sound as loud and dangerous as thunder in the desert, a resounding pounding for a straight pathway for the God who shatters the skies wide open with all His wild truth…
With all His holy, unmanageable love that scours the dirty brave right clean.
Ann Voskamp
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life: acoustic & amplified 