Ordinary Time 
Pause
What does it take to tell the truth about ourselves? To admit we don’t know everything. To let go of distorted images. To refuse to pretend to feel things we don’t.
What does it take to tell the truth about God? To admit we don’t know everything. To let go of distorted images. To refuse to pretend to feel things we don’t.
Humble and honest prayers begin with telling the truth to ourselves and to God — about ourselves and about God.
Let us pray.
Listen
Those who put their strength in you are truly happy; pilgrimage is in their hearts. As they pass through the Baca Valley, they make it a spring of water. Yes, the early rain covers it with blessings. They go from strength to strength, until they see the supreme God in Zion.
Psalm 84:5-7
Think
Let’s be honest: we make mistakes that have lasting consequences. We’d rather feel good about ourselves than see others lifted up. We are not always aware that we need God’s mercy, and we don’t always feel uplifted when we struggle. We even ignore God’s constant invitation to find our way home.
Thankfully, pilgrimage is in our hearts.
A pilgrimage is different from a road trip or a nature walk or a family vacation. Pilgrims travel to experience the holy — not only when we arrive at the end of the route, but all along the way. The psalmist says pilgrims seeking their home in God “go from strength to strength,” as if every stop builds us up, prepares us for our destination, shapes us to experience joy and express praise.
Let’s be honest: we need to take this journey together. All our mistakes and confessions, our highs and lows, our times of deep brokenness and true happiness lead us “from strength to strength.” All along the way we can find ourselves, even as we seek the way to God.
Nikki Finkelstein-Blair
Pray
God, you know I am always going somewhere. Every day I discover a little bit more of the road I am on.
Even when I stumble, when I go the wrong direction or sit down to rest or even move a little backward, help me to experience strength on this pilgrimage.
Help me to find my way to you.
Amen.
Go
When we say “Amen,” we are saying, “Yes, truly.” We are saying, “Let it be so.”
In our silences — in our unspoken requests and questions — we hold the “Amen.”
In our stops and starts — in all the ways we move through life — we act out the “Amen.”
In our hesitations — in our uncertain ideas about ourselves and God — we remember the “Amen.”
In every silence, in every stop and every start, in every hesitant thought, God goes with you.
Yes, truly. Let it be so.
Amen.
