“That’s what Jesus wanted for himself; not a ritual, just intentional awareness every time we gather in his name or take a drink or eat a piece of bread, that he is there, and that he gave his life for us.” –Phil Baisley, Fruit of the Vine

Query: How does your faith community remember Jesus? How do you make yourself intentionally aware that Jesus is with you?

Follow the Flow

Knowing her first, I felt her stream run smooth,

skip playfully on rocks

and fall down liquid hills.

“Follow the flow,” was her advice.

I did not understand.

In later years I met her once again.

She was a river grown,

swollen with life,

pulled by strong currents down toward unknown seas.

One felt the peaceful eddies, and the deep longing

for the ocean’s bed,

and she ran blue as the late summer years she bore.

“Follow the flow,” she said.

Then there was parting, and we did not meet again

until one year when frost was chain about us.

I wondered, then, if she had frozen, too,

into the static waiting of old age,

reverting back to narrow winter stream.

But when I saw her eyes, I knew

she was Pacific now, and stretched horizons and beyond.

Ice could not crust on her

nor the frost chain

but rather wisdom pulled her tides.

Her deeps were heavy with the weight of love.

I understood, then, what it is to follow flow:

someday, one meets and mingles with the sea.

–Carol Bialock, Coral Castles