Dear People of St. Francis’,
I recently read: faith is a solitary journey that we cannot do alone. This encapsulates the connection between our individual faith-life and our worship together. We come together on Sundays to give praise and be fed spiritually through Word, song and prayer; we then take those things into the world and into our personal reflection and prayer.
Two weeks ago, Lauren Meadows, who has recently begun worshipping at St. Francis’ with her family, took the Word and sermon about Moses and the burning bush into her personal prayer. What emerged was a magnificent poem that Lauren graciously shared with us (see below). May this poem be prayer for you and feed your individual faith journey as it ties you to our St. Francis’ community!
In hope, Laurie+
Burning
by Lauren Meadows
When was the introduction
to that which I am so intimately familiar,
but with characteristics so unlikely, my
heart was struck with terror?
What drew me, this particularly peculiar
day to walk westward around the bend of
new discovery?
Fear hung low, yet, curiosity gave her
clarion call, and I inched my way
carefully closer as defined threshold
demanded a halt,
and feet so bare my soles
breeched brambly ground.
Soiled shoes, indeed, would
contaminate and spoil messages
soon delivered with intensity.
My angry arguments assault the air
enough without the faithless filth
of the wearied world to add to my
muddied mis-understandings.
Frightened, I stare on
too dumbstruck to deny
what I intrinsically knew –
I did not want to be consumed.
Attempting to protect temple and
thoughts, using my own self-defense:
tongue, as incompetent as I thought her to
be, flapped in the breeze
until I flat wore out.
Recognizing, as if for the first time,
both speech and wind were formed
by a breath not my own, and
Lacking vision for this moment,
and all those to come,
my word-wrestling wearied to a halt.
Widened atmosphere made way for the
acuteness of sacred sound to find her way
inside my internal reverberating rooms –
Buried. Alive.
Echoing back melodies
of deep empty filling to overflow
as the rushing of Who I AM called to me
to become who i am completely.
Reflecting on mirrored time
lines formed overlapping in
robust overtness to paint, with accuracy,
the true picture:
I was wholly consumed
by the frightening radiant fire,
and what was left of me
shined.