Wanderings & Ponderings

How do you connect most closely with your spiritual side?  Is there a special place you go, or a certain time of the day that works for you?  I don’t know about you, but I really need spiritual, physical, and mental balance in my life.  If I don’t give some attention to all 3 of those areas, I struggle. In today’s blog, I share what works best for my spiritual side as I try to process my relationship with God and the world around me.

The place where I experience the presence of God most in my life is not a church, a cathedral, or an ancient holy site.  I experience the presence of God in nature. I always have. When I walk down a dirt path in the woods, with sunlight glimmering through the leaves and casting shadows on the trail in front of me, I’m in.  Something clicks, and I find myself feeling connected with God in a way that is meaningful, powerful, and intimate. Maybe it’s all my early years as a Boy Scout, but the verdict is in – I’m a nature guy.

Something about God’s creation speaks to my heart and connects me with the Creator.   It doesn’t matter if I’m walking in the woods, beside a stream, or on a beach. I could be riding my bike, hiking a trail, or paddling my kayak.  As long as I’m outside in nature, I feel like God is there with me.

So I’ve decided to include in this blog some of the insights, prayers, and thoughts that come my way as I’m wandering through the woods.  Let’s call it “Wanderings and Ponderings” and see where this journey leads.

While I don’t know where it will lead, I do know where it will begin.  Let’s begin by considering how we process what is going on in the world around us, and where (and whether) God is present somehow in the midst of it all.  The way we process and interpret our circumstances is vital to our faith, our health, and our well-being. And let’s be honest, there’s a lot to process right now, isn’t there?  How do you go about processing your thoughts, your circumstances, and your perception of reality?

Whether we want to admit it or not, we all process our thoughts and perspectives in one way or another.  My intention is to choose to process them in ways that turn out positively and productively. That is not always easy, but I do believe it is possible.  Soon I’ll be sharing three keys that help me process my perspective in positive and productive ways.

Check back here for the next blog entry to discover those three keys and how they can help you.

God bless,
Pastor Jeff