Coracle Trust E-Reflections
Running and kneeling
Tuesday 5 October 2010
When will my eyes of rejoicing turn peaceful? When will my joyful feet grow still? When will my heart stop its prancing as over the summer grass? Lord, I would run for you, loving the miles for your sake. I would climb the highest tree to be that much closer. Lord, I will learn also to kneel down into the world of the invisible, the inscrutable and the everlasting. Coming to God: First days, Mary Oliver
Indianapolis 500
Young adulthood to mid life: Time for review
I’ve been caught in the headlights of an image - a driver taking the chequered flag at the Indianapolis 500 car race - and of an equation, well it’s title: the 'uncertainty principle'. The heroic drive for success, to make our way in the world is right and necessary – building some identity, searching for place and striding out towards purpose. However, on the cusp of midlife and its hints of profound uncertainty things may begin to fragment. Ascent seems to tip over into descent. Attempting to move through the gears we stall and a scrunching noise fills the air. The obsessive need to look good, feel good and to be right shudders and stalls, and pales. What’s going on? Certainties may have become more elusive but, if allowed, the divine rushes in.
Restarting the motor?
Restarting the same old engine time and time again doesn’t quite do it for us or requires more determined dampening of the inner voice. This cusp may be well characterised by Don Paterson’s aphorism “and after a long period of reflection, he decided that he was in fact right yet again” – some awkward review ending with a reassertion of previous convictions. We are invited to loosen our grip upon our questions or at least to sit with a different set of faith questions. Insecurity heralds the raw and awkward searching, glaring questions...What success am I driving towards? Is my bid for the chequered flag worth this expenditure in energy? Is it to be the same old same old, pick yourself up, onwards and upwards chivvying talk or might it be that a different faith landscape is now opening up? Lord, I would run for you...Lord I will learn also to kneel down.
