Ordinary Time

Pause

The greatest mystery of our faith is the identity, work, and purpose of the Holy Spirit.

As elusive as the wind, the Spirit evades our capture yet manages to touch, nudge, comfort, or trip us just the same.

Rather than attempting to capture, predict, or define the Spirit, why not simply affirm that the Spirit is and open your heart, inviting God's mysterious Spirit to take up residence in you.

Listen

The Lord’s power overcame me, and while I was in the Lord’s spirit, he led me out and set me down in the middle of a certain valley. It was full of bones. He led me through them all around, and I saw that there were a great many of them on the valley floor, and they were very dry.

He asked me, “Human one, can these bones live again?”

I said, “Lord God, only you know.”

He said to me, “Prophesy over these bones, and say to them, Dry bones, hear the Lord’s word! The Lord God proclaims to these bones: I am about to put breath in you, and you will live again. I will put sinews on you, place flesh on you, and cover you with skin. When I put breath in you, and you come to life, you will know that I am the Lord.”

Ezekiel 37:1-6

Think

What more could anyone want than to have the “hand of the Lord” upon them? To be selected and deployed by the Lord! What an exhilaration! What an honor!

And yet… a moment later you find yourself in a valley of dry bones, surrounded by death, dryness, and the buzzing silence of a withered land. Like the Israelites who longed to return to slavery in Egypt rather than accept God’s difficult path for their lives, it wouldn’t be long before I, too, was ready to return to that time when God’s hand WAS NOT on me!

But after all of that squalling and “howling at the moon,” the questions would still remain…

Why has God brought me here?

Why has God put me in this valley of dry bones?

While the learned argue over whether it was God’s plan, God’s hand, my choices, or random chance that put me in this dry place, I choose to turn my attention elsewhere.

Being present rather than looking back, I ask, “What will God do here?” and “God, what would you have me do here?”

Wade Griffith

Pray

God open my eyes to see and hear you right where I am! Allow me to consider the possibility that your purpose is simply this... “and you shall know that I am the Lord.” Amen.

Go

Today, don't forget that God's Spirit is with you and for you! Receive this gift. Just ask, and off you'll go, arm in arm!

Who knows what adventures, tasks, or opportunities the Spirit might have in store for you today? Let the future begin!