A curious thing is that all of the stop signs are in English revisited.

Know this: The LORD Himself is God; He Himself has made us, and we are His; we are His people and the sheep of His pasture. Psalm 100:3

Sabed que el Señor es Dios:
él nos ha hecho y a él pertenecemos;
somos su pueblo, el rebaño que apacienta. Salmo 100:3

So yesterday I got another letter from Andres, the guy on the Camino with the healed leg who is now healed all over. And he wrote me just to say that if and whenever he might be discouraged he remembers our words and prayers for him. His life has totally changed since that moment and it was not a coincidence that God put us in his path to open his eyes.

And I do believe that this is a letter from God, reminding me of what is true as I deal with healing of my own, these pesky ribs and bronchitis, and with all of the eye-rolling What do you think you are doing? and heavy duty bike tubes and train tickets and Wow I don’t speak any French and sunscreen and I can but count it all joy.

Because He is God.

And I am the sheep of His pasture.

And He has ordained my path from the beginning of time.

And I think of the day when I first met Andres and his wife and his son and all of those gentle moments when My Shepherd guided my heart. When I grumbled at the very beginning of the day, Nicole pushed me forward, and He carried me up that second highest peak with the refrain, Holy, holy, holy. And as I stood at the bottom of the village of Mondoñedo, staring up at the church at the very top of a very long cobbled road straight up, and God whispered, “Go.” And the sort of grumpy old priest in the back room who said that I must go to the cathedral begun in 1219 on the top of yet another bumpy road up even though I was perfectly content with his humble parish church. And we went, after a cup of café con leche and a mysterious prayer that I will not know the end of until the time of new beginnings. And we ate our beautiful little pilgrim cake in the mid-morning sun, and when God said, “Kneel,” I knelt and prayed for His power and love to be manifest.

And Andres wrote me to remind me of all of this.

And my friend from the Dominican Republic Krista Wallace posted a blog link this morning that further speaks to my heart. And my mind. What is true.

You are on the path of My choosing. There is no randomness about your life. Here and Now comprise the coordinates of your daily life. Most people let their moments slip through their fingers, half-lived. They avoid the present by worrying about the future or longing for a better time and place. They forget that they are creatures who are subject to the limitations of time and space. They forget their Creator, who walks with them only in the present.

Every moment is alive with My glorious Presence, to those whose hearts are intimately connected with Mine. As you give yourself more and more to a life of constant communion with Me, you will find that you simply have no time for worry. Thus, you are freed to let My Spirit direct your steps, enabling you to walk along the path of Peace.

Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life? Since you cannot do this very little thing, why do you worry about the rest? Luke 12:25–26

To shine on those living in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the path of peace. Luke 1:79

And I remember that I chose the title to that day’s thoughts about the stop signs all being in English because the American sensibilities in me always mumble Stop, when He, my Shepherd, calls Come, come with Me.

And I join in the prayer of Andres, that he prays every morning now, giving thanks to God for making His presence known every single day and guiding him through it.

Selah.

A curious thing is that all of the stop signs are in English

No os amedrenteis por temor de ellos, ni os conturbeis, sino santificado a Dios el Señor en vuestros corazones. 1 Pedro 3,14-15

Cristo esta conmigo, !Que consolacion! Su presencia aleja todo mi temor; tengo la promesas de mi Salvador: no te dejara nunca; siempre contigo estoy.

It really wasn't in our pretty tight scheduled plan to be riding up the biggest mountain on the road in the middle of the day with an empty water bottle under a bright blue sky and a blustery wind that kept blowing off my hat, but it didn't matter. With every pedal stroke I was thinking, "No pain! No pain! No pain!"

In the morning I had made a mild attempt to request a Sabbath rest for my throbbing thighs since nothing else had brought even the slightest relief: the carefully coached stretches, the icy sea baths, the hot, hot showers, ibuprofen in regular doses, nothing. This steel grip was my constant companion. But we decided to try an hour or two and to see how that would go, especially since the first part was along a stunning sea coast.

And things weren't so bad this morning, singing over and over, until I forgot the words, because things hurt pretty much:
Holy, holy, holy
Lord God Almighty
Early in the morning
My song shall rise to Thee

So as we stood at the bottom of a hill staring at yet another long, twisty cobbled stone road to the church, we hesitated. Should we release our plans to try and attend mass, and just stay on El Camino?

But, no in my heart, I knew up that hill we must go, whether it was a dutiful offering of my decimo, or an empty water bottle, or a prodding from the Lord, so up the hill we went. And the gold-covered altarpiece reaching up to the stone arches was a perfect meditation, as I knelt down on the creaking board:
Seraphim and cherubim,
All the saints adore You
God in three persons,
Blessed Trinity

But when we went to the back room, to get our credential stamped, the old, very old priest, fussed at us: you must go the the cathedral. That is where all the pilgrims go, this is nothing, a mere parochial church. And even when I mildly protested that we were very humble pilgrims, and this had been a wonderful place to pray, he shook his trembling finger at us, so we made plans to go down and yet another up, right after a cup of café con leche, right next to the little church and the park.

A man led in his friend into the bar for coffee as well. Actually, he had to heft him up on his shoulder and carry him, because of his leg, which sort of looked like someone had wrung out a twisted wet towel. And my heart knotted up as I watched. And I almost got up to pray for him, but not quite. And as they left, I knew I had to follow them out to in front of the church. "Excuse me. If you don't mind I would like to pray for your leg. The Lord God Almighty would like to show His great love and power by healing you in the name of His son Jesus Christ." They nodded, I knelt down on the stones, prayed, and they smiled and nodded a little teary-eyed, and headed off to church, and I back to my coffee. But a few minutes later, the man rushed in and said over and over, "Thank you, thank you! God bless you." And I smiled and nodded, and we headed over the big cathedral built in the thirteenth century, and there was a fruit stand out front, and a bar, and we decided to split a sausage and potato breakfast before heading on up the fabled hardest climb of El Camino.

And at the table next to us, was a nice man with his wife and son, enjoying the beautiful morning, except he had crutches and a huge ugly red swollen leg. And just before hopped back onto the bikes, I had to once again kneel down at his feet and pray for him. And both he and his wife were teary-eyed and smily at the same time, and we waved good-bye and they said, "Buen Camino," like everyone does.

But after we rode down those cobbled stones, I noticed. No pain. At all. None. And I kept waiting for the clench of death, but no, nothing, no pain. And even though we headed down the wrong path, and ended up doing a huge loop, retracing our route, it did not matter. No pain. No pain.

And as we turned up that great big long mountain, I sang "Holy, holy," and wondered about that kneeling and wondering when it was that God healed me, and "Drats, I should have asked those guys if they were totally healed too," when suddenly a white car drove past us, turned around and stopped, and the nice man with the crutches hopped out of the car, and threw them on the ground and ran across the street, and said, "I had to see you again, and to say thank you!"

And his was a long convoluted story, about spending long years seeking wealth and fame, and then he had this terrible accident, and some disease that left half his body numb, and he had been going to this Hindu master, who had been having him read the Life and Times of Jesus Christ, and had told him that soon two strangers were going to pray for his healing, and when I prayed for him, this huge surge of peace had filled him, and he knew his life was changed forever. And Nicole prophesied over him, that God was going to use him mightily, and there kneeling by the side of the road, we prayed for wisdom and truth to guide him in his path, and I ran across the ancient highway and hugged his wife who was crying happy tears, and I gave her my email, because he wanted to keep us up with all of the changes in his life. And it was his birthday, that day, the fifteenth of June, and this was a wonderful gift from God, a new life.

And as I slid my foot into the toe grip before heading on up the steep incline, I realized that more than just the pain in my body had evaporated like the morning mist. My heart and soul were also soaring free in the breeze.

Holy, holy, Lord God Almighty.

And this is only the first third of our day. The rest, well, was also amazing. More to come.

Both unlettered and uncultured

Cristo dice: y yo, si fuere levantado de la tierra, a todos atrarere a mi mismo. Juan 12, 32

Viendo el denuedo de Pedro y de Juan, y sabiendo que eran hombres sin letras y del vulgo, se maravillaban; y les reconocian que habian estado con Jesus. Hechos 4,13

Mam oh man, I am without words and ignorant. All day long. Very much stumbling over the simplest grazie and molto bella and buona giorno. Drats.

And yesterday was a heaping and overflowing basket of goodness, poured into my lap.

First up to cappuccino and homemade bread and out the door. Marco is trying to develop a relationship with the Muslim community and they had a meeting to gather and figure out how to integrate into the Italian community but not really, so the only non-Muslim they had invited to their meeting was Marco and they had at first asked him to help plan the meeting, and then they changed it to just speaking at the meeting, but then they changed that, and asked to just attend, and he ended up with little "reserved" signs on four seats, but when they saw that two of the guests were women, we were asked, very gently, if we would rather sit in back with the other women. And we draped Nicole's prayer flags around our heads and prayed for this community, while they sangprayed and through the long boring man talks and then for the articulate, passionate woman who spoke afterwards even though it seemed like no one was listening to her except us, and especially for Marco, that he would remain under with patience and grace even when it was difficult.

Then to mass. And as I knelt and prayed and listened to the Scriptures and the sermon about the Ascension of Christ and His command to "go into all the world and preach the Gospel and make disciples, teaching them," while I looked up at the massive marble Christ on the cross, I marveled at this great love, Who would stop at nothing to bring all to Himself.   And Matteo's violin sang over us while we shared the Eucharist.

We then drove out for at least ten minutes into the countryside, to the grandparents' farm for a Sunday dinner of roast chicken and rabbit livers and risotto and bread and salad and marinara sauce and homemade wine and cherries and we admired the chickens and rabbits and the vineyard and fields, and Nicole wrapped her arms around this beloved grandmother and Paulo did the dishes.

Quick quick, we zipped home and then off to Ravenna, the beach town where Dante finished up El Paradiso, and we swam out to the long pile of rocks way out there with some clever friends who then lay on the beach with me and discussed Fahrenheit 451 and the Screwtape Letters that they were reading. And now I am going to have to read the Missingman by Chesterton because reading this book that I never heard of changed the direction of his life. We looked up on his iPhone if he wasn't talking about The Everlasting Man, so there is a Chesterton book that don't know. The lifeguard had to row out on his skiff to ask Nicole not to go out past the buoys.

One has to remember that all of this driving is past field after field of grapes and peaches and corn and sunflowers and poppies and massive tiled stone-and-plastered farmhouses covered with rose bushes and jasmine vines under pointy cypress and flowering fig trees, and that it rained all last week but now the skies are very bright blue. Lest I grow immune to my surroundings.

So Marco has gathered together a community of about thirty people, and sometimes there are fifteen and sometimes just two, but they meet every two weeks at different homes to discuss and plan for justice in the city, so we met at this girl's beautiful villa for warm-from-the-oven pound cake and fruit juice and tangy fruits full of brown shiny seeds that I saved for Alan.

Then the just-stop-by, ten-minute planning meeting at the church stretched on and on, which is what happens when you have six strong, bright, passionate men planning for a day-long excursion to Assisi to learn about St. Francis for two hundred kids. And Marco is all about Inquiry-based learning and open-ended questions, and the priest not so much, and yes, things do sound a little complicated reenacting the battles against the Moors and the conversion moment and the building of the chapel of Assisi, but at long last they agree to release control to Marco, sort of, since I did not exactly understand the specifics, but certainly the dynamics were clear.

Chiara had prepared a beautiful ravioli dinner for all of us, which was a good thing, since it was going to be a long night. And as we took one last spoonful before returning to the tasks at hand, one of the young men asked if we had ever met a truly actualized person who did not know Christ. Marco went with "define your terms," and Nicole told Burning Man stories of sincere and dedicated seekers who saw a light around her Prayer and Blessing umbrella, a Light different than everything else in the clutter of man-seeking-truth.

Matteo Number One built a fire in the fireplace because I had taught him that you don't have to be in winter or cold to have a fire in the fireplace when he visited us in Tucson. Matteo Number Two and I cut strips and strips of yellow and red fabric for wristbands and flags for the game and told stories while Nicole painted paper-covered boxes with scenes of the chapels of Assisi and Lugo to use as huge building blocks, Matteo Number One and Luca planned the music, Matteo Number Three who is about to take his priest vows and still has a lot of preparation after he leaves tonight helped out in the kitchen, while Marco cut holes in long sheets of fabric for a game where the kids wear medieval helmets created out of newspaper mâché and poke their heads up through holes like ground squirrels and people throw things at them that I don't really understand; like I said I am an ignorant person who cut four hundred strips of fabric with a young man asking, "How can I know that God really loves me?"
 
Towards the end, Marco asked if anyone wanted a little liquor and as we sipped out of small glasses, he told us how he happened to have such fancy stuff in his home, having rescued a hysterical woman from a huge rat with bared teeth, and her grateful husband gifted him from his rich storehouse. Well, once again, that is what I figured out, I think.

And at the end, as midnight of this gift of a day from the very rich storehouses of My Father, I asked the priest-to-be if he would like to offer up a prayer for tomorrow and the children, and he asked me to do it, and Nicole suggested that we all hold hands and we did, and I thanked God for each of these lovely servants and may each of the children know the love of God and what it is to follow Him.

And even though I am unlettered and uncultured, may they know that I have been with Jesus.

Hot soapy showers are great.

I will sing a new song.

Prayer leads you to see new paths and to hear new melodies in the air. Prayer is the breath of your life which gives you freedom to go and to stay where you wish and to find the many signs which point out the way to the new land. Praying is not simply some necessary compartment in the daily schedule or a source of support in time of need, nor is it restricted to mealtimes or Sunday mornings. Praying is living. It is eating and drinking, action and rest,teaching and learning, playing and working. Praying pervades every aspect of our lives. It is the unceasing recognition that God is wherever we are, always inviting us to come closer and to celebrate the divine gift of being alive. Henri Nouwen, "With Open Hands"

Every dawn, the Italian birds let out a veritable cacophony of raucous melody to greet the rising sun. Crazy loud. And this morning apparently they awoke the seagulls, because they quickly joined in, soaring over the quiet Mediterranean surf. And then the roosters. A new melody. May my heart celebrate the divine gift of being alive, today. 

And may I notice the many signs pointing to the New World.

And we were the first pilgrims that this quite modern (1980) parish church had ever had, and they were so happy and quite nervous and wanted to do it right. And of course yesterday afternoon as I tried to haltingly explain in Italian what I wanted, at last one brother was so overwhelmed, he asked if I spoke Spanish, and hurried off to find the brother who had been a missionary in Peru. After a bit, he asked me if I spoke any English. And it turns out the first brother was an English-speaking Filipino who ever-so-carefully checked each of our credentials before stamping and dating them. Sweetness. As was the very fresh pastries and the carefully frothed capuchinos for breakfast before one of them shouted, "selfie!" And before they prayed for our journey, that we may see God in a fresh way.

And wow, we hit the big stuff right away, a great big hill, and many very long and very dark and very full of wild motorcycle riders tunnels, and the lovely down side. For every up, there will be a down. A beautiful down.

And once again I was quite nervous to purchase fruit in a French street market. The quite brusk Frenchman oddly kept shouting, "Come on, come on," as I struggled to produce numbers and names. But eventually my "s'il vous plaît" and "Non, merci" and of course "excuses-moi" won him over, and we were able to chomp on fresh apricots all day long.

While we were very impressed with ourselves for going through Monaco, actually it was squeezed in tight traffic, lots of it, and long stop lights, and we went no where very slowly, so I suggested up. My brave Brandon blanched (alliteration). "Christy, those are the foothills of the French Alps. We are talking five thousand feet." But all of us were weary of breathing fumes, so I led, somehow the Great Dane bike is leading, with Brandon bringing up the rear, up this tiny curving road straight up. After a bit, the crew decided that this was the driveway to some fancy resort at the top of the cliff overlooking the bay filled with yachts and cruise ships, but no, a kind French woman assured me in French that this was a road, very very steep, but that if we could do it, it would lead us to Nice, beautifully.

Also through La Turbie most beautifully with a Roman triumphant arche on top of this hill of the most beautiful stone village imaginable (and btw French public toilets are a marvel of electronic convenience) and Eze and a national park with part of the Roman Road which we actually didn't find, and Eze with an accent, and Villefranche-sur-Mar. But all of that up paid off in a long, long glorious down along the French Riviera, far more down than any of us thought we deserved, but yep, we had climbed 5,000 feet. 

And as we soared down, down, down into Nice, I pled with my God, much along the lines of Abraham's servant, asking for some steadfast love as we entered a teeming city of two million, "Help Your child to find the train station." We headed through the traffic towards the sea, assuming perhaps that would bring us to the oldish historical part of town, thinking along the lines of Grand Central Station or that refurbished Denver station, but the troops were fading, hungry and tired, so I settled them down on a nice tree-lined street, almost plaza, and went off to seek some kind soul willing to help a lost stranger. But the only person who would pay me the least attention was this slightly tipsy white-haired old man. "The train station?" we sorted out in my brilliant French. "Ah, the train station. Let me show you the train station." And he put his arm on my shoulder and pointed across the street to where they were waiting with the bikes. "The train station," he crowed with a smile. Out of all the hundred kabillion buildings in Nice where we could have paused, we parked in front of the train station. And now we head to Marseilles with nowhere to stay, just a wing and a prayer, and an invitation to celebrate the divine gift of being alive.  

And even if it took us ever so many up and down hills and asking and asking and asking, we did receive, and Tracy is just happily drying off from a hot shower. Alive and celebrating.

Basta

Make the heart of this people dull, and their ears heavy, and blind their eyes; lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their hearts, and turn and be healed.” Isaiah 6:10

He has blinded their eyes and hardened their heart, lest they see with their eyes, and understand with their heart, and turn, and I would heal them.”  John 12:20

The Calvinist passages ... “It’s not really my fault because God is the One who hardened my heart, so it’s His fault, just like old Pharaoh ... He was just being used by God to make a point.” 

It is true.  Our hearts are hard.  But He is not to blame, unless it is the blame of an overindulgent parent who will stop at nothing to bring us to Himself.  It is the hard heartedness of the older brother to whom the Father said, “Everything I have is yours, and always has been.” This is a repetition of “I have withheld nothing from you.”  After having prepared a beautiful vineyard and entrusting it to workers, The Landlord sends the messengers to collect His due, His fruit.  Articulate, passionate messengers.  Nothing.  Again and again, and nothing.  So He sends His Son who once again speaks truth, performs signs and wonders and humbling Himself to even death on a cross.  Nothing.  

The “dull” and “heavy” words of Isaiah are the sorts of words that are used to describe someone who has just finished a huge meal and does not even have the energy to push back from the table.  Eyes are glazed, and the heart is “fat,” and satiated.  Full of ourselves is the problem.  We need no Savior, we are enough.  We are bright, hardworking, have our system in place.  Who is this Landlord shaking the boat? 

The verb tense in John shifted to the imperfect. Here the imperfect is used with a negative, suggesting they were not about to believe because the intentionality was nonexistent. The idea is that they don't believe and are not in the mood or habit of believing, i.e., they had no intention of believing Him.

And Isaiah asks, “How long, O LORD?”  How long will these hearts be hard?  Until we come to the end of ourselves.  

Until the tree is chopped down.  And burned.  And then, and only then, For there is hope for a tree, if it be cut down, that it will sprout again, and that its shoots will not cease (Job 14:7)

And even though we have squandered all that He entrusted to us, He is still our mother, longing to gather her chicks under her wing, He is still our father, pacing back and forth on the road, looking for the repentant heart on the distant horizon.  

How then will they call on Him in whom they have not believed? How will they believe in Him whom they have not heard? And how will they hear without a preacher?

And I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for Us?” Then I said, “Here I am! Send me.”

As was His custom

And when He rose from prayer, He came to the disciples and found them sleeping for sorrow,  and He said to them, “Why are you sleeping? Rise and pray that you may not enter into temptation.”  Luke 22:45-46

Much grievous sin is committed when I am tired or sad.  We are all aware and perhaps even alert to the dangers of crimes of passion, but those of dispassion are perhaps even more deadly.  The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak is where I stop when I reach the end of my own strength and skill and overall general niceness.  It is at this moment when I need to press into prayer, “Lead me not into temptation.”  But I don’t.  I succumb to my fears, worries, selfishness and fleshly excuses.  And lead of life of regret and I-should-haves.  

This moment on the Mount of Olives is when The Tempter returned.  Unleashing his big guns for his final attack on the Hope which is Christ Jesus.  And Jesus met him toe-to-toe.  Not with dramatic signs and wonders, not with piercing biblical truths, nor by gritting His teeth and charging forward, perhaps flailing one of the two swords.

No, He met him alone.  Kneeling.  Seeking strength outside of Himself.  Not My will but Thy will be done.  Thus he was able to say, “...for the ruler of this world is coming. He has no claim on me, but I do as the Father has commanded me, so that the world may know that I love the Father.”

The measure of my love.  When all of my natural defenses are peeled away, where do I turn?  Or do I just turn over in bed, cram a pillow over my head and hope it all goes away?  

And the last chapter is called “The Healing of the Harms."

Ten piedad de mí, oh Dios, ten piedad de mí,
porque en ti se refugia mi alma;
en la sombra de tus alas me ampararé
hasta que la destrucción pase. Salmo 57:1

Turn to me and have mercy upon me; give Your strength to Your servant; and save Your child. Psalm 86:16

Blessed be the Lord day by day, the God of our salvation, who bears our burdens. Psalm 68:19

Jesus taught us, saying: ‘Come to me, all you who labor and are overburdened, and I will give you rest. Shoulder my yoke and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. Yes, my yoke is easy and my burden light.’ Matthew 11:28

Be merciful to me, O God, be merciful, for I have taken refuge in you; in the shadow of your wings will I take refuge until the time of trouble has gone by. I will call upon the Most High God, the God who maintains my cause. He will send from heaven and save me; he will confound those who trample upon me; God will send forth His love and his faithfulness. I lie in the midst of lions that devour the people; their teeth are spears and arrows, their tongue a sharp sword. They have laid a net for my feet, and I am bowed low; they have dug a pit before me, but have fallen into it themselves. Psalm 57:1-5

So really my favorite thing to do right now, in this sorting out period is read the Narnia Chronicles. And as I curled up with my very favoritest one yesterday, The Silver Chair, and with my favoritest character, good old Puddleglum, God spoke to me again and again. And yes, whomever I was talking to last week, I think C. S. Lewis is definitely anointed, and that the Spirit has spoken through his wise words to many a soul throughout time.

And some of the bits are just practical, such as ““Crying is all right in its way while it lasts. But you have to stop sooner or later, and then you still have to decide what to do,” and “Life isn't all fricasseed frogs and eel pie,” and “You do not see as quite as well as you think,“ there are some profound eternal truths wrapped up in particularly the webbed-foot, stringy-haired marshwiggle, that speak gospel truth to my aching heart.

“...Aslan didn't tell Pole what would happen. He only told her what to do. That fellow will be the death of us once he's up, I shouldn't wonder. But that doesn't let us off following the signs.” 

“Don't you mind," said Puddleglum. "There are no accidents. Our guide is Aslan; and he was there when the giant king caused the letters to be cut, and he knew already all things that would come of them; including this.” 

“One word, Ma'am," he said, coming back from the fire; limping, because of the pain. "One word. All you've been saying is quite right, I shouldn't wonder. I'm a chap who always liked to know the worst and then put the best face I can on it. So I won't deny any of what you said. But there's one more thing to be said, even so. Suppose we have only dreamed, or made up, all those things-trees and grass and sun and moon and stars and Aslan himself. Suppose we have. Then all I can say is that, in that case, the made-up things seem a good deal more important than the real ones. Suppose this black pit of a kingdom of yours is the only world. Well, it strikes me as a pretty poor one. And that's a funny thing, when you come to think of it. We're just babies making up a game, if you're right. But four babies playing a game can make a play-world which licks your real world hollow. That's why I'm going to stand by the play world. I'm on Aslan's side even if there isn't any Aslan to lead it. I'm going to live as like a Narnian as I can even if there isn't any Narnia. So, thanking you kindly for our supper, if these two gentlemen and the young lady are ready, we're leaving your court at once and setting out in the dark to spend our lives looking for Overland. Not that our lives will be very long, I should think; but that's a small loss if the world's as dull a place as you say.” 

But most of all, I am reminded that the enemy is the Liar, who wraps me up with coils as green as poison, with a forked tongue that flickers in and out horribly, but whose head can be hacked off with the sword of truth, even if the horrible thing can keep coiling and moving after it dies, and leaves quite a nasty mess.

I lie in the midst of the Liar who devours the people; his teeth are spears and arrows, his tongue a sharp sword, but God will send forth His love and his faithfulness.

I will call upon the Most High God.

Selah.

The call within the call.

The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit;
    a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise. Psalm 51:17

Your eyes are like a window for your body. When they are good, you have all the light you need. Matthew 6:22

We can do not great things, only small things with great love. What is important is not how much you do, but how much love you put into doing it. –Mother Teresa

So yesterday I hitchhiked for the first time.

One thing God has been speaking to me about on this journey is the good humility that comes from receiving hospitality, to confessing need and to open up one’s hand instead of one’s front door. Which for me is a lot easier. I like opening up the front door.

But I don’t have one any more.

So I held up an assortment of signs and held out my thumb on the curve of the road suggested to me by the desk clerk, right next to the sign announcing the exit of Assisi, leaving the city of peace.

And honestly, it was not out of financial need that I hitchhiked. I had a pocket full of euros. It was more about the need to practice asking and receiving. And it gave me a tiny glimpse from the eyes of those who ask by the side of the road. Eyes that look with hope at each passing stranger. And a tiny longing of expectation, perhaps this will be the one…

Swish, swish, swish. Car after car zipped by, with barely a glance. Each car dangling a Francis cross from its rearview mirror. Swish.

And so many times I have swished past. And edged past with the anxious excuses and averted eyes of the priest and the Levite. And I also felt the weight of my God Bless America country and our collective closed fist.

And once a car slowed down and indicated with hand signals that he was not going in my direction.

And as time wore on, I had to move forward to keep standing in the shade. Later on there was no shade. Just the hot sun and the hot pavement.

But I made the decision. I chose to stand in the sun. It was an option that so many do not have.

And after a long while, a small black car pulled over and a kindly man opened the door. And he really wasn’t going to take me far. He took me to the train station. And gave me two euro to buy coffee. And asked for prayer for his mother-in-law who is having surgery today. And I drank an espresso and went to the toilet and greeted a fellow pilgrim who was returning to Munich.

And then I stood just a bit down the road from the train station. In just a bit, another man pulled over and opened the door. And I didn’t exactly understand what he was saying; I thought he was saying that he could take me half way since he was on his way to Milan. But really, he too wanted to find me a better place to stand, at the entrance to the highway to Milano.

The sun was quite hot now.

The cars were slowing down to take a right to Assisi or speeding up to go to Milano, when one last car pulled over. And he was a young guy, who tried to come up with lots of options for me to do anything but hitchhike. And finally we decided that the best thing would be for me to take a cheap bus to Bologna, the one his girlfriend always takes to visit her family. So he drove and drove way out of his way, to leave me at the bus stop at Perugia.

So I took the bus. In addition to receiving rides and coffee, I would also like to practice receiving advise.

And each of these men did small things with great love.

And even though this was just a morning in my very full life, I am hoping that it becomes a road marker in my mind and heart, and mostly in my eyes.

May I have the eyes of the one standing or sitting or even lying by the side of the road.

And may this light fill my body, and my hands and feet each day.

He said, “The one who showed him mercy.” And Jesus said to him, “You go, and do likewise.” –Luke 10:37