Week One, Day One Hope

As we prepare to practice Visio Divina, prayerfully gazing rather than glancing, letting our eyes explore to the very edges, we begin first by focusing on our own breathing.

Breathe in the count of three...exhale to the count of six or seven.

Breathe in the One who Creates, Redeems, Sustains you right here and now...exhale the distractions of things you have to do.

Breathe in an openness, willingness, and hopefulness...breathe out the fears that close and cut you off.

Look at the image and let your eyes stay with the very first thing that you see. Keep your attention on that one part of the image that first catches your eye. Try to keep your eyes from wandering to other parts of the picture. Breathe deeply and let yourself gaze at that part of the image for a minute or so. 

Next, you may want to make a list of everything you see.  Or you may want to name just one or two things you notice, then ask yourself why you are focusing there?

Now, let your eyes gaze at the whole image. Take your time and look at every part of the photograph. See it all. Reflect on the image for a minute or so.

Consider the following questions:

What emotions does this image evoke in you?

What does the image stir up in you, bring forth in you?

Does this image lead you into an attitude of prayer? If so, let these prayers take form in you. Write them down if you desire.

Reflection:

Hope is like a flower in the desert.

Hope is like a flower in the desert which is in the middle of the Alaskan wilderness.

Hope refuses to play by the rules of the game we were taught and told since childhood.

Hope joyfully and playfully laughs at our human abilities to white-knuckle life by clinging to control and invites us to breathe, be, taste and see that God's goodness is around us.

After three hours in the car stopping to take pictures every two miles, my family stepped into the sand of Carcross Desert in Alaska.  To say it was unexpected is an understatement.  Alaska is supposed to be snow, cold, and bears roaming not sand and desert.  Alaska is supposed to be rugged pine trees weathering the harsh, hard winter not taking your shoes off to feel the tiny grains of sand in-between your toes.  If I wanted to be at a beach, I could have stayed in Florida.  Yet, there is a desert in the most peculiar place.

This was a bit like God deciding that a stable - a dusty, dirty, and drafty stable – was the place to be born.  God deciding a cow shed - where animals lived - was the threshold of heaven and earth.  God picked a shack with gaps between the boards that couldn't keep out the night chill as the best place to show up in the world God so loved.  "Yup," God said, "This will work wonderfully for the new thing I am doing."

What?!?

It is absurd.

It goes against the grain.

It refuses to play by the rules of the game of life we have been taught and told since the very beginning.

It is like a flower blooming in the desert ~ which was and still is the way God’s hope arrives in the world.

May you be awake, aware, and alert to such serendipitous traces of God's grace in these Advent days.

Blessings ~~