Look up and out

My daughter loves to ride horses, so yesterday we found a corral and hired a guide to take the family on a trail ride around the Lake Louise area.

I have almost no experience riding horses, so I was quite preoccupied for a while learning how to ride a horse proper and give it the right commands.

Aside from Moslin, my gelding, wanting to eat green grass which he was strictly forbidden to do, all went well.

After 30 minutes or so, I looked up from the trail and realized there was a gorgeous lake view to take in plus a multi-layered and brilliantly colored jettison of rock bulging out of the earth on the other side of the water to admire. I had been so engrossed in riding that horse that I had become oblivious to my surroundings.

Aha! I exclaimed. How often does this happen in our travels through the highways of life? How often do we get so focused on what we’re doing that we fail to see incredible and beautiful sights whizzing by us? And they are gone without us even realizing they existed!

I pondered some of the states of mortal thought that are wrapped up in a narrow view of things and miss out on much good.

For instance, take self-absorption. A mindset absorbed with self interest doesn’t appreciate and see all the good going on in their neighbor’s life. It doesn’t matter to them. Or take gluttony. It doesn’t consider the long term implications of over consumption because it doesn’t care. It wants to consume and does so with indifference to the benefits that come from moderation, discipline, and finding contentment outside of food. Or the pursuit of money! Greed and lust race through life with laser focus on financial accumulation often to the detriment of moral and spiritual growth.

There are many other narrow limited views of existence I could enumerate that keep the human mind preoccupied and ignorant of a greater good to be seen and acknowledged.

And then there are the bigger errors of “I am mortal, I am sick, I am poor.” These constrained views of reality would really limit experience to a confined sense of things and have one spend day after day missing out on immortal blessings, health and satisfying wealth.

I decided that believing “I am mortal,” would be like me watching the mud on the trail ahead of my horse and ignoring all the beautiful flowers, forest, lake and mountains around me. A mortal mindset would ignore eternal life, permanent health and ever-present riches of Love. There is huge physical, moral and spiritual freedom that comes from acknowledging eternal life, no matter how mortal one might feel temporarily.

I committed myself to not watching the muddy trail of mortal belief so much and holding onto the greater more inspiring view of spiritual reality.

The widest view is the spiritual view. The best view is the heavenly view. The grandest view is God’s view.

For the rest of the ride, I declared, “No more getting mesmerized by the trail ahead of me. Look up and out to the glorious sights around me.” And I took the inspiration even higher to behold the glorious creation of God in divine Mind that could be discerned only with spiritual sense.

A feeling of peace took over, and the strain and stress that accompanied worry about the path underfoot faded into nothing.

The family had a fun time, even though a bit wet when finished, and I was better spiritually for the adventure.

On a trail ride beside Lake Louise

God gets our attention

Here at our cabin, I have an office next to the workroom downstairs. In the workroom there is a space heater with a fan we leave on while the cabin is vacant in order to keep the plumbing and water heater from freezing in the winter cold. It’s set to run when the temperature hits 40 degrees.

Last Tuesday, I was working in my office and I heard the heater turn on.

I thought, “That is odd. The heater is set to run at 40 degrees, and it’s over 65 in that room. Why is the heater running?”

I went to the room to inspect the heater and found absolutely nothing wrong with it. It turned off when I picked it up and every part appeared in working order.

As I puzzled over the oddity, I glanced across the room and saw a pond of water at the base of the water heater. What a mess! I dropped all concerns about the space heater and raced to deal with a mini-water disaster about to form. To make a longer story short, the leakage is contained, we have a plumber on the way, all is under control, and we still have hot water. I'm grateful for that!

Later, at dinner, though, I was rethinking the series of events that afternoon, and commented to the family how odd it was for the space heater to turn on at such a high temperature.

Then the pieces fell together.

I decided that the noise of the heater was God’s way of getting my attention. Without it, I would have remained oblivious to the Lake Erie about to appear in our basement and spread into adjoining carpeted rooms.

Sometimes it surprises me how God works, but I’m grateful every time I see divine wisdom in action.

God has a way of getting our attention, if necessary. Of course, we have to be listening! That’s our job… And I was listening at the time, actively engaged in prayer for patients near and far. I think I'll keep working at it...for it helps not only them, but me too!

Critical moments

Have you ever been distracted for an instant, and then made a big mess of things?

It was the funniest thing. I was making whipping cream for pumpkin pie while everyone sat at the table after dinner waiting. We had recently bought one of those handheld whirly-gizmos that whip small quantities, and I decided this was the perfect time to try it out.

So, I poured a cup of whipping cream into the plastic quart container that came with the contraption, and started whipping away. The liquid swirled around wildly, and I made all kinds of noise, which was fun, but after a while the cream started to thicken and the quart container began to turn. I grabbed onto it with my left hand to keep it from rocketing off the counter into outer space.

When the cream got really thick, someone struck up a conversation with me from the table and I temporarily lost track of what I was doing. My left hand loosened its grip, and wham-o the container whirled around at warp speed spewing white stuff all over the kitchen! At first, this was not funny. But the mess was so huge, what can you do but laugh! The family was beside themselves in hilarity. And our daughter had to take a picture.

It was their idea to blog this moment of embarrassment, not mine. But after thinking on the episode, there was an important spiritual lesson to remember.

Don’t lose focus at critical moments!

There are critical moments in tennis, like serving, returning the serve, and hitting the ball accurately. When you’re standing on the court waiting, moments aren’t so crucial. But certain moments in play are extremely critical to the outcome of the game.

When driving a car, some moments are more critical than others. What you’re thinking while idling at a stop sign is probably not as critical as what you’re paying attention to when driving through a busy intersection.

What about prayer and healing? Are some moments more critical than others? Every moment of prayer is equally valuable in moving us toward our final demonstration, but some moments can feel tougher to get through than others.

More than once, I’ve felt on the verge of accomplishing a significant goal, and the tempter starts to work overtime to get me to stop or give up. Those are the moments you don’t want to lose your grip! If you let go, everything whirls out of control and you feel helpless.

Like the time I told my dad I didn’t want to farm anymore because it wasn’t the life for me. He got so upset that I lost my grip. I caved to his pressure to stay. I recanted everything I said, and told him that I would stay with the family farming business and that he didn’t need to worry about me. I would be okay.

I lied about the “I would be okay,” part. My life felt whirling out of control. It was not okay. It took me two more years to get my grip back and tell him with finality that I had to move on.

The second time, I did not lose my grip! And he accepted my verdict.

There are crucial moments when we need to pay special attention to the activity before us in order to succeed. Prayer is not an exception. When the “cream gets thick,” it is not time to let go! If you do, you might have a mess to clean up. Grip harder at the crucial moments and hold on tight until the whipping is done. It's a lot easier that way!