11:09 a.m.
Crazy! That’s what I’m telling myself. You're Crazy!
It’s all my sister’s fault. She sent the stupid email.
The STUPID email I opened and read.
You know the kind: this is your guardian angel and she brings you the promise that you will hear from someone about something very important at 11:09 tomorrow morning. Send this message on to seven of your closest friends so they can be blessed as well.
Argghhhh! I fell for it. I sent the thing to seven friends.
I needed a message!
It’s 11:10 a.m.
What’s the message?
Is it that you can’t fleece God?
I can hear him now: Silly girl, don’t you know? I will not be mocked….or manipulated!
One night a few years ago I was praying under the stars in northern New Mexico. It was a fervent prayer, a deep-seeded groan that and I so desperately needed to hear from God…to know that God was listening and was giving me personal attention.
At just the right moment, a star shot across the heavens, leaving a trail of space dust so incredibly thick that it hung in the sky for several moments. It was like a love note from God written on heaven’s chalkboard.
I loved it. I just knew that God had sent that star in answer to my prayer.
I don’t remember what I was praying about.
I remember the sign.
The problem with signs is that once you get one, you look for the next one. It got so that I couldn’t look up into the night sky without hoping God would send another star shooting across just to say “hi!” I approached the stellar landscape expecting divine hieroglypics and each time, walked away disappointed. It got so I couldn’t just look up and love the handiwork of the skies because of my need for more.
Finally, I realized the only way I could overcome this frame of mind was to go on a star fast. I wouldn’t allow myself to look up. That way I wouldn’t be disappointed. For months when I went out at night I intentionally willed myself to look straight ahead, only looking up on nights that were cloudy or on which the moon was so big and bright that the stars were almost imperceptible.
Eventually, I came back to a mindset from which I could look to the sky just to see the stars, their incredible and beautiful light – the miracle of them simply for their own sake.
Maybe that’s the message of 11:09 a.m.
It was a moment in which I could simply be, a moment to appreciate and relish…even cherish apart from the millions that I speed through unattended.
That little sixty second span was the one thing I had for sure right then.
And I missed the treasure looking for the sparkly….
Ahhh…grasshopper, therein lies a truth.
It’s all my sister’s fault. She sent the stupid email.
The STUPID email I opened and read.
You know the kind: this is your guardian angel and she brings you the promise that you will hear from someone about something very important at 11:09 tomorrow morning. Send this message on to seven of your closest friends so they can be blessed as well.
Argghhhh! I fell for it. I sent the thing to seven friends.
I needed a message!
It’s 11:10 a.m.
What’s the message?
Is it that you can’t fleece God?
I can hear him now: Silly girl, don’t you know? I will not be mocked….or manipulated!
One night a few years ago I was praying under the stars in northern New Mexico. It was a fervent prayer, a deep-seeded groan that and I so desperately needed to hear from God…to know that God was listening and was giving me personal attention.
At just the right moment, a star shot across the heavens, leaving a trail of space dust so incredibly thick that it hung in the sky for several moments. It was like a love note from God written on heaven’s chalkboard.
I loved it. I just knew that God had sent that star in answer to my prayer.
I don’t remember what I was praying about.
I remember the sign.
The problem with signs is that once you get one, you look for the next one. It got so that I couldn’t look up into the night sky without hoping God would send another star shooting across just to say “hi!” I approached the stellar landscape expecting divine hieroglypics and each time, walked away disappointed. It got so I couldn’t just look up and love the handiwork of the skies because of my need for more.
Finally, I realized the only way I could overcome this frame of mind was to go on a star fast. I wouldn’t allow myself to look up. That way I wouldn’t be disappointed. For months when I went out at night I intentionally willed myself to look straight ahead, only looking up on nights that were cloudy or on which the moon was so big and bright that the stars were almost imperceptible.
Eventually, I came back to a mindset from which I could look to the sky just to see the stars, their incredible and beautiful light – the miracle of them simply for their own sake.
Maybe that’s the message of 11:09 a.m.
It was a moment in which I could simply be, a moment to appreciate and relish…even cherish apart from the millions that I speed through unattended.
That little sixty second span was the one thing I had for sure right then.
And I missed the treasure looking for the sparkly….
Ahhh…grasshopper, therein lies a truth.
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