Religion contains certain performances,
Things people do in order to focus the mind
In a certain direction.
For example, the Lord's Supper.
It is intended to cause the initiate to imagine
That they are actually partaking of Christ Himself,
Ingesting Him and thus becoming Him
By continued partaking and remembrance.
If this is done intentionally,
It is an exercise of the mind.
It is a purposeful imagination.
And purposeful imagination has the power to transform.
The biggest struggle with such performances 
Is that they happen but one per week, or month,
Or worse, only once per year 
Or once per lifetime.
Better to weave such purposeful imagination 
Into the fabric of every day.
Let every morsel be the blood and body.
Let every step be a renewal of our faith.
And thus perhaps, through constant remembrance
Be transformed by constant purposeful imaginations
Into the very thing He desires us to be.

I don't know why people content themselves with this world
When there is a better waiting.
And I don't know why they wait for heaven
When heaven waits for them the day long.
Was not this earth God's Paradise?
And might it not be so again
​If only we believe?

The Love of God flows one way,
Like the streams that flow into the rivers
And the rivers that flow into the Sea.
It does not require reciprocation.
It does not fret itself for rain.
It simply lets go to the belief
That those it loves are worth loving.
Even when they're not.
In that way, it is unlike human love.
There are no wedding vows, no conditions.
It is a one way agreement - a choice.
I choose to love you,
To commit myself to loving you forever,
No matter how you treat me.
It says - I will not forsake you
Even if you forsake me.
I will suffer on your cross
For as long as you hold me there.
And when you finally take me down and bury me,
I'll rise again with love in my heart for you.
It is the new love.  
The old love is tattered and worn.
It is almost good for nothing
And is ready to be thrown into the fire
In preference to the new.
And the good news is
That you do not need the agreement or approval
Of anyone but yourself to begin.

The mass of people can be deceiving.
It seems to say that there is more than one.
But those who serve mankind best
Do so one at a time.
And these never grow old.
Their words are remembered 
From generation to generation,
And they are spoken by those
Who never knew them,
And this because they were not fooled
Into believing that there is anyone
But the one person before them
​Just here, just now.

I have come to believe that the things we write 
Are written in heaven.
And I believe that the things we feel
And the truth as it exists in our own souls
Can be felt by those with souls 
Receptive to such feelings.
And so perhaps the great work
Always was and is a thing of the heart.

At the beginning of a long race,
I look out upon the horizon
And do not see the end.
I begin by one foot in front of another.
Pat, pat, pat.
And the lazy me screams at mile 1/2 - "go back!"
But I don't.
Only 25.7 miles left.

​I asked God to protect me from evil and darkness
And I thought that meant that he would give me peace.
What I did not realize
Was that my plea for peace
Was really a prayer to make things easy.
I didn’t know that the path of peace,
The path that leads out of evil and darkness,
Is narrow, with dangers on every side,
And that the thing to fear was not pain, but complacency.
For the real danger lies in the fact
That we are at peace with the evil,
And we are at home in the dark.
And we call it simply living.
And until he makes us weak,
Until the very appearance of evil causes us pain,
We are in danger.

I crossed a finish line today - 
The end of all that I can do.
I have obeyed.
I have done everything He asked.
I have spent my means, down to the last few dollars.
And now it is in His hands.
And though I have not yet seen with my physical eyes the miracle,
It does not diminish my joy in His deliverance.
For my end, I know, is only the beginning.

Are you at peace right now?
If not, take a moment to meditate, to relax completely.
And then look up from the plane of the earth
To the clouds above the horizon.
Now imagine better things,
Just there, just a little higher than the earth.
It's not so far from us.
In this way, you will join the work
That will raise the earth to a higher plain.
But only if the thing you see when you imagine
Is in keeping with His highest intent.
Otherwise, your light is darkness,
And if so, how great is that darkness.

Sometimes faith is going about your business
When all hell threatens to destroy.
It is the kind of trust
That knows and doesn't need re-assurance.
And the truth travels with you
In everything you do.
And every act, however menial
Becomes a prayer
Because you could be doubtfully pleading
​For a thing you don't believe.
I wonder if this kind of faith
Is the last frontier.
I wonder if it is the final state 
Of those who have traversed the trackless path,
That in the end, they rest in sacred knowing.
And all of their prayers are prayers of gratitude
For the truth of that which is,
And the truth of that which was,
And the truth of that which yet will be.

Have you ever known a thing that only you knew,
A truth that lived within your bosom
And nowhere else?
It was a personal truth,
A thing which you needed to know,
A promise which kept you moving forward
Toward an unseen holy goal.
Did you know that such truths can die of neglect,
Especially when it's known to only you?
For it is more like a seedling than a cinder block.
It must be watered and fed by your belief,
By your continued repetition
And by right action.
And if you nourish the seed,
One day it will bloom for all to see.
It will manifest itself, not only in your heart,
But in miraculous deliverance unto the impossible.

We do not work at earthly things.
And the things of every day of the week
Must finally come together into one.
And it is about time.
For it is the Sabbath of the earth.
And our worship and our rest
Must mingle with the things we do for labor.
And labor too must claim the day of rest.
And though there be but few who now enlist,
Know that this work, this rest, will fill the earth.
And in time, the houses of worship
Will go vacant.
They will grow deathly still with lack of use.
And the sacred silence of abandoned things
Will claim them for the owls
And for things that creep and crawl in the night.
For we will worship at the grinding wheel
And we will labor in the service of the souls of men
In such a myriad of ways
That we will not be able to tell the difference
Between the religious and the secular.
For so it is with all those 
Who serve the sacred wind that blows where it pleases.
They cannot tell from whence it came or where it goes.
And eventually, they lose track of the days of the week.
They abandon their calendars,
And forget to count their years.
And when they do, they grow both old and young.
And time, for them, is done away,
And all things are made new.

When you know a thing is right,
Not by earthbound means,
But from above,
Move forward.
Take a step 
And then another.
Move slowly if you must,
But keep on moving.  And if you do,
The fire of the promise
Will shine upon your path
And open up the way before you.
You will experience clarity and reassurance,
And further light will come.