Reflect, Resonate, Reevaluate, Respond

We shake with joy, we shake with grief. What a time they have, these two housed as they are in the same body.
~ Mary Oliver, 1935–2019, Evidence: Poems

I walked a mile with Pleasure; She chattered all the way. But left me none the wiser For all she had to say. I walked a mile with Sorrow And ne’er a word said she; But oh, the things I learned from her When Sorrow walked with me!
~ Robert Browning, 1812-1889, English Poet & Playwright

Psalm 126

Until Christ completely cures us and this world, our happiness will be punctuated by times of great sorrow. But that doesn’t mean we can’t be predominantly happy in Christ. Being happy as the norm rather than the exception is not wishful thinking. It’s based on solid facts: God secured our eternal happiness through a cross and an empty tomb. He is with us and in us right this moment. And he tells us to be happy in him.
~ Randy Alcorn, 1954- , founder of Eternal Perspectives Ministry

The reason we don’t want to feel is that feeling exposes the tragedy of our world and the darkness of our hearts.
~ Dan Allender, The Cry of the Soul

All joy (as distinct from mere pleasure, still more amusement) emphasises our pilgrim status; always reminds, beckons, awakens desire. Our best havings are wantings.
~ C.S. Lewis, Letters of C.S. Lewis (Nov. 5, 1959)

May all your expectations be frustrated, may all your plans be thwarted, may all your desires be withered into nothingness, that you may experience the powerlessness and poverty of a child and sing and dance in the love of God, who is Father, Son, and Spirit.
~ Larry Hine, Spiritual Director

Reflect, Resonate, Reevaluate, Respond

The way of Jesus cannot be imposed or mapped—it requires an active participation in following Jesus as he leads us through sometimes strange and unfamiliar territory, in circumstances that become clear only in the hesitations and questionings, in the pauses and reflections where we engage in prayerful conversation with one another and with him.
~ Eugene Peterson, 1932-2018, Pastor/Teacher

~~~~~ Psalm 125 ~~~~~

I wanted a perfect ending. I’ve learned, the hard way, that some poems don’t rhyme, and some stories don’t have a clear beginning, middle, and end. Life is about not knowing, having to change, taking the moment and making the best of it, without knowing what’s going to happen next. Delicious Ambiguity.
~ Gilda Radner, 1946-’89

We demand rigidly defined areas of doubt and uncertainty!
~ Douglas Adams, 1952-2001

The fear of uncertainty is rooted in this belief: God won’t meet me in the way I am desperate for him to show up. And our greatest certitude is this: God is already in the room.
~ Shelly Miller, Spiritual coach

Insistence on security is incompatible with the way of the cross. What daring adventures the incarnation and the atonement were! What a breach of convention and decorum that Almighty God should renounce his privileges in order to take human flesh and bear human sin! Jesus had no security except in his Father. So to follow Jesus is always to accept at least a measure of uncertainty, danger and rejection for his sake.
~ John Stott, 1921-2011, Anglican Minister, The Cross of Christ

It helps, now and then, to step back and take the long view. The kingdom is not only beyond our efforts, it is beyond our vision. We accomplish in our lifetime only a tiny fraction of the magnificent enterprise that is God’s work. Nothing we do is complete, which is another way of saying that the kingdom always lies beyond us. […] We lay foundations that will need further development. We cannot do everything and there is a sense of liberation in realizing that. This enables us to do something, and to do it very well. We may never see the end results, but that is the difference between the master builder and the worker. We are workers, not master builders. We are prophets of a future not our own.
~ Ken Untener, 1937-2004, Bishop of Saginaw