STAY CENTERED.

"Centered in God's presence, I find peace."

My first thought is, "I wish." What does it mean to be "centered"? It sounds like something from yoga, and I'm not into yoga, although maybe I should be. Between being overwhelmed every day, I have "new normal" days when I just go nuts trying to cope with my mom's dementia.

"Centered." It brings thoughts to me of the eye of the hurricane. Or maybe the eye of a tornado. Do tornadoes have eyes? The only one I ever saw was moving too fast for me to tell.

I try to stop and think about this and not just let these thoughts bounce around in my brain.

When I am centered, I am balanced. In balance, I am steady, confident, empowered, peaceful, and strong.

Unlike a hurricane, I have to stop spinning to find my balance. I am not a top or a gyroscope. I may live in the midst of a hurricane, but I need to rest, to connect to God. Without an anchor, I just keep spinning like a kite on a string in the March wind.

I need to be grounded on a rock. There was nothing more grounded on this earth than the Cross at Calvary.

Centering does not eliminate suffering, but it allows me to stop and connect to God and to find peace in the middle of my own private hurricane.

"Centered in God's presence, I find peace." It is not the peace that the world gives.

TRUE PRAYER

Too often my prayers become a series of distracting thoughts, ending up going around in my own little treadmill of repetition. A prayer book introduces other things, ideas, and people to pray for and about, brings higher thoughts to my weary mind, broadens my misty horizons, and lifts my spirit above my petty burdens.

But sometimes when I try to pray, my eyes skim over the familiar words. For years I have felt guilty and tried to go back and reread (re-pray?) with limited success. And in church I couldn't do that anyway.

Last week it came to me that it didn't matter. God knows what the words are. They are more to remind me than to remind Him! And if there is something I really need to see and have sink in, He always draws my wandering attention to it, so that often I find something new I would swear I never saw or read before!

The important thing about my prayer time isn't so much the words I say or don't say, but to simply be quiet in His presence, drawing His strength and peace into my heart and mind and spirit. And if "reading" familiar prayers keeps my mind on Him, even if the meaning of the words isn't penetrating, that's the important thing.

Prayer is perhaps as much focusing on God as it is petition, thanksgiving, praise, or intercession.

PROTECTED
Psalm 36:7-9 (New Living Translation)

7. How precious is your unfailing love, O God!
All humanity finds shelter
in the shadow of your wings.
8. You feed them from the abundance of your own house,
letting them drink from your river of delights.
9. For you are the fountain of life,
the light by which we see.

Sometimes, if you have no one to run to, you can feel God's hands on your shoulders, His arms around you, His love enfolding you. He is always there, but if we are depending on others or distracted by our challenges, we won't recognize His touch.

The Light of God surrounds us.
The Love of God enfolds us.
The Power of God protects us.
The Presence of God watches over us.
Wherever we are, God is.
(--James Dillet Freeman, Unity's Prayer of Protection)

The Lord is my Shepherd. Yea, though I walk through the Valley of the Shadow of Death, I will fear no evil, for Thou art with me.

I have always envisioned the valley as a dark, barren place, with a bit of gray light--enough to see, but dim and threatening. The "valley of darkness" some translations call it, or the "valley of the shadow," the "valley of death," or "a difficult time."

It's difficult all right!

"I will fear no evil" the Psalmist says, so obviously evil is present in this valley of the shadow of death, or might be. But then he adds, "For Thou art with me!" The Lord is with us in this valley, on this journey?

But if God is there, then there is light--His light! And not just a dim grayness.

Maybe this shadow is just that: a shadow. From what? A tree? Probably a dead tree, casting a large creepy shadow. Or might it be the Cross? It could be from a huge rock, for probably no trees ever grew in that barren place.

But then again, King David speaks of green pastures and still waters. Lakes and ponds may rest on mountains in cirques or tarns, but those are still valleys of a sort. Lakes and ponds of still water are commonly found on valley floors. A stream forms a valley--rushing, tumbling, burbling streams come down the mountains and hills.

"Still waters" can, of course, refer to ice or snow, and may be found if one takes a pathway high on the mountainside. God doesn't say we have to stay on the main path on the valley floor. Green pastures can be found high on the mountains just as in low fields.

But "green" and "lakes." There is suddenly for me a vision of Light, if not sunlight. (St. John said no sun or moon was needed in God's presence, for He is the Light thereof.)

This valley isn't dark after all. But maybe it is Life itself, and we journey through it. We can't see the end, anymore than we can anytime we walk somewhere new with a friend, or a Friend.

And the Shadow is just that: a shadow. Dark, but insubstantial--not really there, but just a shadow, like a reflection. You can pass through it, and if you're busy talking to your friend, or praying to your Friend, you might do no more than notice coolness on a hot summer day.

"Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for Thou art with me."

I look at the valley differently now.

IN THE SILENCE
"Amen" is not "good-bye."
I used to be reluctant to leave a church service or to get up from praying, feeling that I was losing that wonderful connection with God. Sometimes I even avoided saying,"Amen," even though I knew it was from the Hebrew and means something like "so be it," a traditional ending for prayer and an affirmation or ratification of a statement or a plea. This morning when I finished praying in my quiet time, I suddenly understood that because God's presence never leaves me, "Amen" is not "good-bye." I may from time to time forget about Him, but fortunately He does not forget me. "Amen" is not "good-bye."