Saturday Ruminations

It is evening and I am perched up here in my fourth floor room, the window open to the blue light and cool, the laughter of my housemates flitting up from the garden. My mind is awhir tonight after the ceaseless activity of this past week and it is good to sit in the quiet of my garret and think of, in the words of Bilbo Baggins, “all that I have seen”. I have spent the past week sitting in on one of the conferences put on by Christian Heritage and it has filled my thought to flood point. There were three days of basic education in apologetics and worldview, one day with a theoretical physicist on the topic of God and science, and another day spent delving into the reliability of Scripture. In between I talked a mile a minute with fellow believers from the world over; Romania, Holland, Georgia, the Czech Republic, and got a glimpse of faith as it is being lived in a dozen different lives in a dozen different places. It’s really quite something to discuss the finer points of creation and suffering over tea breaks. It all fills me with a frenzied thought, an eager excitement of contemplation that, as soon as I have become coherent again, I will be sure to share.

I look forward to condensing some of the things I have heard into a post; giving out again the nuggets of truth that I have so graciously been given. My time here is expanding my thought on issues that had never before concerned me, I find new horizons of thought opening up in me as my capacity grows with the training I receive to understand the power of Biblical thought in every realm of human endeavor. I look forward to sharing a bit of what we heard from Ranald in our tutorial this week. But I also find a surprising renewal of old values, long-held truths in me. I see, with slightly amused eyes, my sudden appreciation for everything my parents have taught for years. Of course I always believed what they said about family and values and such to be true. But now I get it. It really is true. (Oh it’s a fun thing to be young and discover humility!) I look forward to writing about that too.
I’ll be posting soon on all this. And, of course, must get up some pictures of the dear staff at CHC and our fellow intern and comrade in evening fun, Nathan. So look for some new posts soon.

For tonight though, I intend to rest, and I wish the same to you. Today has been my first day off in awhile and the idea of sabbath rest has lurked in my thought all day. My days are filled with worthy things; with people and ministry, work and deep discussion, but in the busyness I lose that center of soul from which all life takes its meanings. Without my morning quiet, my blessed few minutes of prayer, I am less able to reap the goodness from all that I am doing. I am amazed sometimes at how desperately I need the centering of Scripture. I need the grounding of quiet, the renewal of God’s presence hovering in my hushed thought in order to live fully present to the world and goodness around me. Apart from those foundational minutes of quiet, I find that I grow callused to the beauty God is weaving through the hours and days of my life. My days here have been crafted by him, but apart from his daily grace, I cannot reap his goodness. A day of Sabbath rest is the drawing back of my soul into that center place of spirit where God enriches, renews, restores me so that I can enter fully into the “good works that he has created”. So to end these thoughts on this dim blue evening, I wish you good sabbath. I wish you rest and peace; a spirit renewed in the ease of the weekend so that you and I both may enter life again and reap God’s joy to the full.

Goodnight my friends.