What can love do today?

The creation we are in was not made by us.  It is not ours.  We are caretakers. 

The above sentence is, obviously, counter-cultural.  Cultural forces delight in subtly squeezing us into lanes that we will maintain, not for our benefit, or creation’s benefit, but for the benefit of the one who made the lane.  We learn to identify who belongs in the lane, who is scary, what should be said and done, and what should never be said or done.  We grow isolated to our lane and the limited parts of creation to which it is attached.  And we are taught to defend our lane and our right to protect it and proclaim it.  But such is at odds with creation.  Our wander into our lane was easy; it offered shelter, perhaps shade from the sun, and like-minded others for our comfort. 

Creation asks more of us.  It gives us all and it asks some; it gives us freedom and asks that we respect the freedom enjoyed by others.  Creation asks, beckons us, mysteriously to recognize our home is in creation, not in a lane offered to us.  Creation beckons us to wonder, to open ourselves to possibilities beyond our imagining.   We learn to know that we greet one another in love just as we are held in love.  We learn to be patient as we recognize that this glorious creation cannot be comprehended in a moment, in a reaction, or a day.  Yes, moments of insight may come to us in a flash.  Then what?  Do we run with the flash?  Or do we settle and listen:  Is there love in it?  Not self-love, but the love born of creation and offered freely to us? 

For our opportunity is a life of love, of listening for and acknowledging Spirit in our lives, recognizing that all around us on this Quaker journey are unique, all of us belong, all of us have another step to take, and all of us must be patient, in love and wonder. Not patient that a leader will show the way or give the answer, but that in respectful listening, Spirit will guide us.