Remade!

I am in awe of God’s presence in all things. It is not just that God is near us. God is also within us and beside us in every created thing. I have learned that, even in the most difficult times, God is within me. In fact, God is perhaps nearer in the hard times.

How narrow a pathway those hard times bring! There is nothing to be seen on the left or on the right. It is a feeling of being trapped in one’s own sadness, wondering if the narrow path will ever end, wondering if the world will ever open up again. It is as if I am being forced to look within myself because the path is too narrow to see anything else. The sunlight is hidden. The light of stars and moon doesn’t show itself. There are no mountains or forests or valleys or seashores. There is just the narrow tunneled path and the will and the courage to keep moving through it. And even there in that tight, restrictive space, I sense God’s presence.

I can rest on the promises of this quote by Jan Richardson from her book on reflection and prayer, In the Sanctuary of Women.

The mystics invite us to remember what we all too often forget: God is everywhere present in the world, suffusing creation with the being of God. Once in a while, if we keep our eyes open, if we look closely enough, something amid the familiar reveals itself, offers itself to us in a new way. What we know, what we have learned, is taken apart. Is remade. Remakes us.

So many times in this life, I have been remade. It’s by the grace of a loving, ever-present God.