Four Things I Forgot

“...do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought at a price.” (1 Cor 6:19, 20a)

I was startled by the words of the Apostle Paul that I read one morning last week.  I’ve read them before, of course, but they startled me anyway. Too often, in my head, I have to be the one reminding God who I am, what my name is, what’s going on in my life and that HELLO... I'm over here!! I feel like I have to implore him not to forget about my details, and plead for a sign that my number will come up at some point. These feelings intensify in valleys where the shadows loom dark, and the voices of fear, worry, grief, and sorrow are deafening. But last week, the tables were deftly turned, and the question of who was remembering – or not – was pointed to me. There were four things from Paul’s words which I needed to remember.

Holy Intersections

"Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good!" Psalm 34:8

When I tumbled into belonging to that extraordinarily blessed group of people called God’s children, I was completely unprepared for just how blessed I was to become. “Blessed are the poor in spirit... those who mourn, the meek, those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, the merciful, the pure in heart, the peacemakers, and the persecuted…” Blessed, right now and forevermore, is anyone and everyone who finds and enters into the Kingdom that is Among Us.

These stones are alive!

“As you come to him, a living stone … you yourselves like living stones are being built up as a spiritual house..." 1 Peter 2:4(a)

Photo by Jon Tyson on Unsplash

Twelve large standing stones, hauled up from the bed of the Jordan River, stood on the east bank and cast their tall, rounded shadows on travellers and passersby. It was evident that each stone had been purposefully and laboriously erected at some point in days gone by. They were there as a memorial and a witness to some unusual happening that should not – and could not – be forgotten.

Young children, clutching the hands of their adults as they walked along the way, squinted upward at the towering rocks.

“Why are those rocks there?” they would ask. Parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles gladly pressed the pause button in their day and sit in the coolness of the shadows for a few sacred moments of story-telling.