Interesting that the last two unifying events on this continent have been natural phenomena rather than political. Something trans-political which gets our focus on a common wonder (in the case of the eclipse) or vulnerability (in case of storms) as humans. Just a note I’m taking as I go!
As the ancients used to say: “Famine makes all people hungry and cooperative.” Harsh but true. And so does a gorgeous sunset. There are different ways to come home to one another. We are all in the same boat on so many levels friends.
Both trauma and beauty can guide us home to love one another and work together as family! One or the other will eventually, it seems. And sometimes both do.

Bit more storm wisdom:
Unless your called to stay, it’s not weakness to leave the front lines of trauma. If you are called into it, then you’ll know and be in Peace, and given tools to help out and partner in blessing! That’s how it was for me at 911 and every other trauma I’ve been near (which are way too many unfortunately).
Sometimes we are called to be right in it, other times to make others safe and live some more chapters ourselves.
Neither option offers denial as an option. We have to be aware now of the whole world’s traumas, but we also have to pick our battles and healing collaborations well, so our gifts are used to bless the most people, creatures, and places possible.
A little calm storm wisdom for you today, as I was praying for friends along the Texas coast! Fun harvesting what i’ve downloaded so far in my heart. Some traumas are His alone to tend, and others He lets us help out! And grow through together.
I like the idea that not every trauma is ours to know or bless, and yet, some part of His Heart is out there working to bring Peace. Wisdom knows what’s yours to tend! Learned that much so far at least, slowly, despite myself!

A little storm wisdom today:
Storms seem to lack a sense of humor, maybe that’s why Jesus calmed them, so we could see in Him standing calmly in Peace. You have to question preachers without humor, my uncle used to say! Wise man. “If you know God, you are always slightly chuckling inside on some level.” Like a grandfather chuckles at what we get worried about as kids. Of course, that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t take storms seriously. Humorless things can kill you, but not in a way which kills your heart!

In my dream last night, i was traveling from city to city and country to country, but I had infinite time in each to get to know them! It was so pleasant to have no time pressure or logistics pressure, so i could just listen and really resonate with each place and it’s story! When i woke up, i thought, wow that really is one of my dreams! To get to have endless time with each person, city and nation to get to know them, and love them forever. Great dream anyways!

Some people make you look at the world with more gratitude. Others, more astutely, and accurately. Some just make you wonder more. I love borrowing my friend’s lenses, and seeing through them what I couldn’t see alone. Life is diademic. We each see in part, and each part is so sacred! Learning that again this week. How to see more whole-y, or holy.

Jesus as the Ultimate performance artist!

Jesus was always discipling as performance art. Teaching in every direction! Doing things, but aware that everyone was watching, so giving each person and culture, the part they needed to understand, step closer, and become-to enter in!
My friend got me thinking about Jesus as a performance artist today. That He was symbolizing what He was saying all the time, so it had both types of content in each gesture.

Teaching those who were close students and those who were watching from afar (including us). Using words and symbol in tandem. What a great teacher, aware that His Life itself was the ultimate teaching, so how He lived was also His message. He was constantly symbolizing Himself and pointing to His Father!

Nothing He did wasn’t symbolic as well. They were one in Him. Jesus was integrated! King David said, “I have become a living portent or symbol!”

Great fresh insight again today as I spoke with my art pastor friend in Rotterdam today! The prophets did is also of course, but even where Jesus slept was a teaching, and how fast He walked, and where. Each gesture a symbol! What a great artist. For Him symbol and idea weren’t separate. He was One, and is making us one like that!

Good reminder today! Love chatting with friends who have integrated their creativity and their spirituality, always gives me fresh insights!

“Ebed-Melech is mentioned in the Book of Jeremiah chapter 38 as an Ethiopian official at the palace of king Zedekiah of Judah during the Siege of Jerusalem.”

Everyone needs an Ebed Melech in their story! He was the advocate for Jeremiah the prophet, who pleaded with the authorities to get Jeremiah out of the pit. There is always an advocate in our stories, someone who sees the heart of God in the situation, and pleads the cause! An advocate for the prophets—what a cool role in the story!

Without that guy, Jeremiah, would have had a hard time finishing his story! Good reminder of the importance of those friends in our lives today! Interesting also that in this story, the advocate was a “foreigner”. That rings true also! Good meditation today as I was reading my favorite lamenter Jeremiah today! I love all the painting of Jeremiah, he is always in a cave, half collapsed from emotional fatigue! And from wearing his heart on his cloak, so to speak!

Some of my friends are parables. Dave is one! He’s a spiritual director arts pastor, teaches on depth formation, teaches workshops on discovering and sharing your personal life story, but also just reads great stories on his porch to friends each Sunday night. What a gift to listen in this week. And to visit his hand made fish aquarium. He always models an integrated life. Thankful for friends who do.

We are stewards of the unseen as well.

From an article i’m working on about art:

There is this implied transcendence with art. It makes you aware there is more than meets the eye to everything. That’s part of its role, to suggest that there is more around us than is literal, or merely utilitarian—to remind us everything is also resting inside a poem. That taking out the trash can be prayer. (And prayer is itself a similar activity to art).

A thing or simple activity is more than itself. Art reminds us that. Or, as the comedians reminds us a pocket comb is also a plow for farming, in the right hands and imagination. Seeing the possible layers of meaning of each thing is part of what art sharpens in us. In this sense, it offers a fuller interpretation of the world around us. That’s another part of its role.

To know there is an enormous room everything is in, brings hope that in fact, this is not all there is. And these days, if this is all there is, we are in trouble! So if the surface is depressing, we probe beneath it to find more layers, and that brings hope. Making art is an act of hope, especially in times of tumult.

In this sense, art does more than ritualize collective grief (which is does and needs to be doing), but it offers hope by showing us the larger setting of the play, and therefore other possible outcomes.

Art also implies transcendence, or as Paul Tillich put it: “A symbol participates in The Reality to which it points.” Art offers a portal or gateway into something higher.

The act of art also, models trust there is something to hold me, once i let go, as L’Engle (“Walking on Water”) put it: “To be an artist means to approach the light, and that means to let go our control, to allow our whole selves to be placed with absolute faith in that which is greater than we are.” That vulnerable tight rope act, models hope for others, and that artist becomes a living sign.

Lastly, art is a basic part of being human. We lose a dynamic part of being human if our lives are artless, if we do not dare collaborate with God. Again, as L’Engle puts it, and I’ll end here: “Thus we lose our human calling, because we do not dare to be creators, co-creators with God.” (Reflections on faith and art)

In times of great distress, far from being a luxury, art becomes like water again, essential, an act of faith.