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Prayer Request
We have a prayer team of people across the country who feel called to the ministry of prayer, and who receive regular requests from friends like you.
Send your prayer requests to us here, and we will include you in our next prayer team letter.
Be as general or specific as you would like, and tell us what state you live in. You will be held in prayer for 30 days.
Each month, Terry and Tracy Moore send an inspiring e-mail to their prayer teams. We will share these with you on a regular basis.
October 2011
The Borders of the Seasons
I wonder what life would be life if we didn’t try so hard to live within rigid borders. As I sit at our dining room table and watch the color-filled, cascading leaves raining down, I become aware of how the change of seasons flow one into another. It’s not like there is a line of demarcation between them, one day it’s spring than the next summer, then one day it’s summer and the next fall. And then one day its fall and the next winter and then the seamless cycle begins again as winter flows into spring. We as humans seem to perceive borders between things as necessary and real. We create or try to anyway, borders around us to keep us safe and protected, when what they actually often do is only keep us separate one from another and from the rest of God’s glorious and magnificent Creation. We are created to be relational with our Creator, with each other and with all manner of created things.
It feels funny to me, now, to think of how we even now ‘border’ things within manmade time frames, instead of within the flowing cycles of the moon, as our ancestors did. Like the seasons listed above, someone decided that there are 4 specific dates on the calendar when one season changes into another, like the recent September 21st, which here in Michigan is often celebrated by organizations with an “end of summer” festival. There is a much older way to honor this change – they are called the spring and fall equinox and the summer and winter solstices and they do not fall on the same calendar date each year, rather they are based on the movement of the moon through her cycles.
I do understand why we feel the need to create borders, whether borders of time, that allow our days to have some structure, or borders between locations, like countries, so that we feel our place and space belong to us alone. Seems to me that our ideal places, like the Garden of Eden and Heaven, are places without any borders.
One of our favorite poems is called Footprints and it depicts a scene along the seashore where there are footprints left in the sand. Sometimes there are two sets and sometimes there is only one and the author asks God why and God replies that when we see only one, it is because God is carrying us. As I picture this scene now, I am aware of the ever changing line between the seashore and the water. This border changes on a regular basis as the tide ebbs and flows and so, the footprints are impermanent, being washed away each time the tide comes in. If we are to remember that God is always with us, we need to have faith that even though we may not see any footprints at all, our Creator is with us, sometimes walking alongside us, sometimes carrying us, always within us, where there are no borders created by our physical form to keep us separate.
August 2011
The Beginning
“Finding the treasure is only the beginning of the search”
~Henri Nouwen Source: The Inner Voice of Love
I find this an interesting way to look at a treasure hunt, that the job is only partly done once the treasure is found. In our Western culture it seems that we have been indoctrinated with the idea that finding the treasure is the final goal. This logic certainly negates the teaching that joy is found in the journey and not in the destination and it leaves out the part that another journey begins after the treasure is found.
Following are the words to ‘Joy in the Journey’, a song by Christian musician Michael Card which speaks of the Christian journey toward a treasure:
There is a joy in the journey, there’s a light we can love on the way.
There is a wonder and wildness to life, and freedom for those who obey.
And all those who seek it shall find it, a pardon for all who believe,
Hope for the hopeless and sight for the blind.
To all who’ve been born in the Spirit, and who share incarnation with Him,
Who belong to eternity, stranded in time, and weary of struggling with sin.
Forget not the hope that’s before you, and never stop counting the cost
Remember the hopelessness when you were lost.
There is a joy in the journey, there’s a light we can love on the way.
There is a wonder and wildness to life, and freedom for those who obey.
I began writing this a week ago, before I had surgery to remove the screw from the bone in my foot that I broke last January. The procedure was more intense than I had expected it would be. So I’m waiting to feel the Joy, waiting for the release from the pain and discomfort that I had expected would come immediately after the surgery. And I’ve been reflecting on how to finish this letter I started.
What comes after one finds their treasure? I’m sure we’ve all heard stories about how a large number of lottery winners end up broke within a short period of time after receiving their treasure. And we’ve also heard the stories of those who feel the need to hoard their treasure instead of sharing it. And I’m sure there are many, who like me, expected immediate relief from whatever they felt burdened by. Although, I had no doubt I was to have the screw removed (was I obeying? I’m not sure.), I missed the mark (sinned?) by expecting immediate relief. Sometimes I wonder if God will someday lose patience with me for hastily jumping to the conclusion I think I want and need.
Then God sends a reminder of God’s love for me, renewing my belief that we all have been invited to experience the “Joy in the Journey… and the wonder and wildness of life” and I begin to move along again on my journey, trusting in the love of the Ultimate Guide to the treasures of this life, Jesus, the Christ.
How is your journey progressing? What treasure are you seeking? May you always remember, God has better things in mind for us than anything we can imagine and hope for.
Faithfully,
Tracy Moore
Tracy Moore lives in Michigan with her husband, Terry, and volunteers her time and energy as our prayer team leader. She is a trained spiritual director.