God is working in my neighbors’ lives. They haven’t told me this, but I know it to be true. Just across the street He is filling a new mother with joy. Next door He is drawing a young couple closer to prepare them for their years ahead. He is upholding the one with Alzheimer’s disease who perseveres in the parts of life he can still navigate. God is with all the little ones at the babysitter down the block and the big ones who left for college. I like to consider how God is moving in the lives and homes all over this town. In fact, I must.

These people are God’s children. They may not have told me this, but I know it to be true. It is important for me to regard them as such, that they may recognize and confess it too. Imagine the work God is doing in every life, drawing in the ones who have wandered far, nurturing and encouraging the ones who know Him well. I mustn’t interfere with a single person’s journey to know their Lord and Savior, by treating any one as anything less than a child of God.

It is incumbent upon me to see Him in them and acknowledge His love for them, the same love He has for me. He may not love what a person is doing, but He loves His children and wants each one to humble his heart and come to Him. Jesus said “Love your neighbor as yourself.” I must love my neighbor as the child of God he is.

Let no one seek his own good, but that of his neighbor. 1 Corinthians 10:24

One Easter my mother tried something new. Instead of a basket on the dining room table full of colored grass and jelly beans, my sister and I awoke to a bunch of strings tied to our bedroom doorknobs. One by one we followed each strand to its end, somewhere in our house. There, wrapped in pretty paper, was a small gift, like a white marble egg or a pack of barrettes. It was a delightful morning, so fun for us little girls to imagine where each string would lead.

That morning we happily dropped our strings in favor of the gifts Mom had hidden for us, but being “at the end of one’s rope” is usually how one speaks of loss and despair. As long as there is rope the possibilities are endless, but where the rope ends so do the possibilities. Or so it seems.

To come to the end of one’s rope, one must have had a long struggle, holding on for dear life, grabbing and pulling the rough cord hand over hand, staring down at each prospective length with expectation and hope until hope runs out. Then the dispirited moment of collapse and release. But this is the moment, on my knees God raises my head and eyes to Him. It is the moment He has been waiting for.

God always wants to begin something new in me but often I am staring down at my own interests, unwilling to see Him. It is only when I run out of rope, when my efforts fail, that I turn to see what He is offering. What looks like the end is only an opportunity to find God’s gifts of new beginnings.

The mind governed by the flesh is death, but the mind governed by the Spirit is life and peace.  Romans 8:6

The waves break as far as my eye can see, rising white on the dark water. There is always change, always new, always hope, always God. He is infinite. So am I in Him.

I jotted these thoughts in my journal on the last silent day of my retreat. Though I had practiced at the park, submitting to God minute by minute for eight whole days was at once weighty and liberating. Weighty only because it was ponderous and deliberate. Liberating because my soul had longed for this for decades.

I didn’t know what to expect on my first meeting with my spiritual director. I found her sincere and faithful, I knew God had placed me in her hands. When I told her I was writing a book about my walks with God, she asked me if I intended to work on it during the retreat. That was my intention. She suggested that I put it aside and spend the time with God. “When you are generous with God, “she said, “He is abundantly more generous with you.” The truth in her words aligned in my spirit. I put my work aside.

That truth did not weaken as I drove away that last day. Submitting to God isn’t an option, putting Him first in all ways is the only relationship with Him. God is above all, there is no maneuvering around that. Each moment is His moment; it is mine only to submit.

Oh, that you had heeded My commandments! Then your peace would have been like a river, and your righteousness like the waves of the sea. Isaiah 48:18

I stayed on the point where the lighthouse still stood, the ocean hugged the cape and sun rose and set in all His glory. Women of God had gathered to retreat, reflect and rejoice in that huge rambling house with the red roof for one hundred years. I had never done anything like it in my life and I was nervous but positively exuberant.

The eight day stay, ten including arrival and departure, would test my commitment and stamina but I had exercised those things in the past year. I learned that I could honor God with my time and devotion. I had begun to see myself as capable and strong, always with the help of my Redeemer. I couldn’t play small anymore at His expense. I had learned to show up and commit to remaining strong in Him. Christ is faithful to me. He will never betray me. I love and commit to Him because He sacrificed His life for me.

Here is a trustworthy saying: If we died with him, we will also live with him; if we endure, we will also reign with him. If we disown him, he will also disown us; if we are faithless, he will remain faithful, for he cannot disown himself.  2 Timothy 2:11-13

What am I doing for Christ? What does Christ ask of me? He provides the love for my love, the faithfulness for my faith. I can only ask Him for the grace to live my life and serve Him according to His ways.

You then, my son, be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus. 2 Timothy 2:1

One day at the pond I was blessed to witness swimming lessons. Seeing they were headed past my bench, I readied my lens and captured each charming entrance. Seven members of a goose family floated into frame in perfect succession.

Geese exhibit organization in everything they do. They don’t risk, they follow and execute. Seagulls are another animal. They don’t have the luxury of a composed setting. Their plans are thrown to the wind all day long. I watched their improv from my beach chair and saw no seagulls in formation. The sea winds toss relentlessly, echoing the briny swells from which they come. A seagull may get to where she’s going or she may get whatever she gets. She must yield, accept and ride it out.

One afternoon, I prayed on a porch at the retreat house, high above the beach. A young man I knew had been in an accident and I was unusually moved to text every person who would pray. I continued my appeals for him from the porch rocker, my ears kissed with sounds of children on the beach and a gull calling from a cupola. The scripture I had received earlier from my spiritual director sat waiting on my lap. Suddenly a jet shattered my peace, rocketing sideways the narrow strip between my porch and the beach. I glimpsed the belly of the machine so closely it seemed I could reach out and touch it, but it was at once swallowed into the heavens, as impossibly as it came.  I smiled and realized the prayer soldiers had powerfully reached God’s ears.

It is a privilege to observe the structure, swirls, surges and surprises of God.

Devote yourselves to prayer, keeping alert in it with an attitude of thanksgiving; praying at the same time for us as well, that God will open up to us a door for the word, so that we may speak forth the mystery of Christ Colossians 4:2

The ocean didn’t reflect like a still, dark pond. It crashed in, carrying jumbles of images and memories, dumping them on my feet and spraying them salty on my skin. I waded in the surf many times a day, silently searching the shells and smooth stones. Each morning I met the newest light and the fresh, cool sea air. I gobbled those molecules to sustain the hours. The days were never boring or uncomfortable but they were long. Being attentive to moments makes them full and ample.

I liked to watch the sandpipers skittering near the water. These tiny birds with quick, skinny legs probed the sand for food the moment a wave receded and instantly, like fighter jets, raced off in all directions ahead of the next frothy curl. I didn’t get the feeling that sandpipers reflect or consider much besides eating and avoiding being pulled into the vast ocean.

Sandpipers might not need to reflect, but I do. Though they were the cutest things to watch, I wouldn’t want to be like one, to spend my life sprinting and grabbing and sprinting again. But this is how I become when I don’t abandon my busyness once in a while and reflect. If only for an hour.

God met me in my reflection. He had some puzzle pieces to drop into place too. Who knew He was holding them the whole time? God welcomes my reflection. It is slow, sane time together when He gifts me with the pearls I miss as I busily run from here to there.

Examine yourselves to see whether you are in the faith; test yourselves. Do you not realize that Christ Jesus is in you—unless, of course, you fail the test? 2 Corinthians 13:5

I walked with God from August to August of one year and for the following twelve months, I allowed the experience to unfold in me and onto these pages. It takes a gentle space to let things settle in then rise to the top, to arrange in my thoughts what I have come to know so deep in my marrow. To float and fathom, fathom and retrieve.

My walks with God were a retreat from my usual pace and groove and the more I retreated, the more retreat I craved. One day on a whim I drove to the southern point of New Jersey, my birthplace, to take my walk in a state park on the shore. Later, sharing the experience with a friend, she told me about a retreat center there and I couldn’t sign up fast enough. In August, during the last weeks of this year of walks, I took a silent eight day retreat where I met with a spiritual director each morning. She told me, “It takes a week to complete a retreat but a year for the experience to unfold in our lives.” I have found this wonderfully true! Gifts of both “retreats” continue to manifest richly in my life.

At the park my feet met with ground set apart from my normal life. Every inch holy, each step divine. I would otherwise be dull to yellow irises standing at a sluggish pond. Koi had seemed alien and odd, not the splashy playmates who sometimes spoke the metaphysical to me in their cumbrous way.

Retreat, because when they find one alone and quiet, irises, ponds, and koi have something to whisper. Retreat because God prefers to speak under a mantle of gesturing leaves, where gurgling water meddles in to tell half of the story. Or perhaps that’s just how I hear Him best. Anyway, retreat.

As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, my God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When can I go and meet with God? Psalm 42:1-2

I don’t know if there is a lovelier story in the Bible than the book of Ruth. Naomi had lost her husband and sons and was returning to her homeland a bitter woman. She encouraged her two daughter-in-laws to do the same with the hope of remarrying and finding a new beginning. Orpah did as she was told and returned to her people but Ruth refused to leave Naomi’s side.

Once in Bethlehem, Ruth gleaned fields for grain to sustain them and a landowner, Boaz, a distant relative of Naomi, was impressed by her kindness to her mother-in-law. He looked favorably upon Ruth and soon they were married and had a son.

The story of Ruth reminds me to dig deeply and attend to what is true and good. It’s not that Orpah did something wrong, it is that Ruth did something golden. She shared the burden of another, not because she was told to, but because of love and loyalty.

The book of Ruth is rich with acts of faithfulness and blessings, beginning with Ruth’s loyalty to Naomi. God had a great plan of love and redemption–Naomi and Ruth, Ruth’s son Obed, Obed’s son Jesse, Jesse’s son David–all the way to Jesus.  Ruth could have never known that her name would someday be in the genealogy of the greatest redeemer of all.

At this, she bowed down with her face to the ground. She asked him, “Why have I found such favor in your eyes that you notice me–a foreigner?” Ruth 2:10

If anyone comes to me and does not hate his father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters–yes, even their own life–such a person cannot be my disciple. Luke 14:26

Jesus calls me to have a complete and limitless love for Him such that my love for my own life dissipates in that glow. He calls me to live in that love for Him and only Him. “Hate” is a compelling word. It tells me that Jesus is keenly aware of the immense influence others have over me. Following Jesus requires detachment from all else.

I can be deeply affected by the words and actions of others, but Jesus doesn’t call me to be vulnerable to their whims and emotions, he calls me to be wholly receptive to Him.  When I keep my mind vigilant for Jesus, I do not allow His flawless truth to be supplanted by falsehoods.

How many days have I turned away from Jesus to brood over curses and lies, my foolish, misguided attention potentially hatching them into my life? I hate and renounce the power I give others to seduce, manipulate and alter what Jesus has told me is truth. But Jesus tells me to do good to them and bless them, pray that they come to love Jesus. Love them as Jesus loves them, but don’t hang on their words.  Hear only Jesus.

 “But to you who are listening I say: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you.” Luke 6:27-28

I saw a show on deep sea fishermen in the North Atlantic–the conditions they faced in order to catch fish! It was then I became aware that God really does make us different. I realize people need work to feed their families, but I couldn’t imagine a scenario that I would end up working on a ship in the freezing, rolling, wild and dangerous North Atlantic. Thank you for the salmon, brave fishermen!

God gives His children gifts and prepares them for the work He has ordained for them. I believe there are parts of me—yearnings, interests, even apprehensions—that He has stirred, notions to notice and nurture. Something I may brush off as a pipe dream or impractical could be a gentle nudge from God to explore. If it is from God, He will help it grow or, if it’s not growing but the notion’s still stirring, I am to stay faithful until it begins to give fruit. In winter, the fruit tree would seem incompetent. It is only after leaves emerge, buds appear, flowers unfold and die off, that the fruit appears.

I smiled when I saw this tree on my walk. Perhaps it’s two trees, I couldn’t tell, but I saw myself in it. There is the plain ole me, standing strong, going about my earthly business and the spirited, enthusiastic me crowding in saying Let’s do this! This is good! We need to do it! Instead of ignoring or trembling at the ideas, I am learning to listen and sit with the possibilities. Could God be rousing me to bloom and bear fruit? Should I gather my courage and sail new depths and lower my nets?

We have different gifts, according to the grace given to each of us. If your gift is prophesying, then prophesy in accordance with your faith Romans 12:6