Unfinished

Looking long and hard at that word can fill us with feelings of failure or it could fill us with the thrill of unseen hope. Failure if we think of unfinished in the sense that what should have been done was not done. This has a way of making us feel guilty about what is unfinished. I've had plenty of that in my life, in fact, I would say I have had enough of that in my life. Or, on the other hand, unfinished has within it something that could fill us with a sense of hope. Hope if we think of it as the journey being unfinished, that there is still more ahead, more mystery, more to do, more to be done, it's just that it is unfinished.
I have been enjoying a book by Brian D Mclaren called the "The secret Message of Jesus". At the end of the book he quotes a poem written by a man martyred in 1980, the Archbishop Oscar Romero of El Salvador.

It helps now and then to step back and take the long view
The kingdom is not only beyond our efforts,
It is beyond our vision.
We accomplish in our lifetime only a tiny fraction of
the magnificent enterprise that is God’s work.
Nothing we do is complete,
Which is another way of saying that the kingdom always lies beyond us

No statement says all that could be said.
No prayer fully expresses our faith.
No confession brings perfection…
No set of goals and objectives includes everything.

This is what we are about:
We plant seeds that one day will grow.
We water seeds already planted,
Knowing that they hold future promise.
We lay foundations that will need further development.
We provide yeast that produces effects beyond our capabilities.

We cannot do everything
And there is a sense of liberation in realizing that.
This enables us to do something,
And to do it very well.
It may be incomplete, but it is a beginning, a step along the way, an opportunity for God’s grace to enter and do the rest.

We may never see the end results….
We are prophets of a future no our own.

Restless

I recently watched a young woman as she told me a tragic tale of love gone astray. Her voice quivered, her legs jumped up and down and up and down at the knees as she worked out her saga of woe in the chair across from me. She shifted often in her seat, like she was nervous to be taking about something so close to her heart but having nobody else to trust she figured she might as well spill her heart and soul to me. She was restless; wondering if it was all going to work out ok!
I've been feeling kind of restless as of late too. Can’t put a finger on it just yet as to why or even why now at this moment but it is a restless feeling. Almost like when you know you are supposed to be doing something but you can’t remember what it was you were supposed to be doing! Restless.
As far as I know the only thing I have ever found that helped relieve this uneasy feeling is to read the word of God and to pray and one of my favorite things is to sit outside at night and look at the stars. They are magnificent! And somehow they relax my soul, put my heart at ease and calm my restless spirit. The heavens declare the WOW of God and shout his praise. Somehow, I get lost in that and when I emerge out the other side... restless has been replaced with resting. My God has everything in his mighty care, including me!
God is Good All the Time!