“Be still and know that I am God…”  This quote from the Hebrew book of Psalms (the 46th psalm, in fact) must not be well-regarded.  We scroll our Blackberries, text, drive, work out, work, network, over-work, study, chill with a bottle, cruise, organize, volunteer, a-list, e-mail, i-phone, you-tube, watch TV, overeat, undereat, and drive some more, but, to hear us talk, or watch us in action, you wouldn’t think that God has anything to do with any of it.  Sometimes I wonder if the guy who hangs out in the park near his pickup with a single golf club and defunct tennis ball, caring for his dog and talking to the other park-hangers, might have a better chance of dropping his pretense and knowing who God is than I do.  He appears to have far fewer responsibilities than I, but I’m sure he makes his dog and his friends happy, which might be the most important part he has to play around here.  Maybe the fellow has zeroed in on his life’s purpose, I don’t really know.  So, what does it feel like to relinquish power and authority, and just listen to and follow the promptings of the one personality underlying all that is?  What is it like to live in God’s world instead of the little one I have imagined just for myself?

As surely as nations have personalities, and organizations have characters, families have essences, and individuals have souls, the universe has  an underlying spirit.  What would happen if we all listened for this spirit all day long and in our dreams at night?  What if we searched out and found in ourselves and in other people and in nature, too, the trails and markings that remain wherever this spirit has passed?  The ancient Hebrew scriptures called this spirit by many names, but the most powerful and everlasting is Love.   I hope that the woman in my mosaic is dreaming of Love.  I hope she wakes up to taste and see and smell Love and that she allows Love to flow freely through her and into the rest of us.  I, too,  would like to be as in repose in the spirit of Love when life seems painful and pointless as when it is fresh and beautiful!

Repose