Two Minutes for God: Quick Fixes for the Spirit - Softcover

Introduction

People ask me, "Are your stories true?" I reply, "Yes, absolutely they are -- except for the parts that aren't, and I won't tell you which parts."

This collection of devotional stories comes from real life. They are tales about me, my neighbors, my friends, my family, people I know, and people I don't know. Stories come from paintings and films I've seen, and from poems, essays, and books I've read. There might even be a yarn about you. Folks in the harbor town where I live are always trying to figure out which story is about them or me (and I keep them guessing about that). The stories in this book were originally written for broadcast on a TV program called Daily Devotions, which is seen during the morning news on the two NBC affiliates in Maine every day. Daily Devotions, aka the First Radio Parish Church of America, has been on radio since 1926 and on TV since 1954. You can also find us at www.dailydevotions.org.

Why stories? Human beings have been telling stories to one another since we discovered language, because we reveal ourselves through stories and because the Teacher told stories. I quote the Teacher frequently, often paraphrasing his remarks to capture a subtle meaning, to ease reading, or to fit with my conversational style of writing. No matter how simple my stories may seem, I hope they illuminate a tiny piece of the sacred that exists inside the secular. It seems to be working because one day while shopping for boots at the L.L. Bean store in Freeport, Maine, a salesclerk told me that the Daily Devotions stories he watches on TV are like shiny little nuggets he carries with him in his pocket all day. It was kind of him to say so, but it's not for me to say exactly what the stories are or aren't to those who hear or read them.

The notes provided for many entries correspond to Scripture, but the message is God's job, not mine. I'm just a storyteller winding my way through life on my way home.

The Teacher said heaven was his home -- I think it is mine and yours, too.

My prayer for you is this: may this book help lead you home, and, in the meantime, may God be with you every day in every way.

Copyright © 2007 by PBP, Inc.

Paid to Pray

People ask, "Why did you [usually said with some measure of disbelief] become a minister?" It's selfish. I want God. I went into ministry thinking it's the perfect public cover for a private spiritual life of seeking God. What other job is there where I get paid cash to pray? (It's never much cash, but...) Prayer looks so much like...doing nothing...that it's a wonder I've gotten away with it for as long as I have. As often as I can, I stop whatever I am doing and sit still. I close my eyes, and from the outside it looks worse than my doing nothing in the middle of a workday. It looks like I'm sleeping. Truthfully, sometimes I do fall asleep, but it's rare, and when that happens, it's no longer prayer, it's a power nap!

Prayer can feel like doing nothing. Prayer sometimes appears so unproductive. At the end of a long, hot, hard day of prayer, what do I have to show for it? Sore knees? That's the strange thing about prayer. It looks like it's unproductive, yet in my own life, prayer remains the basis of my connection to God. When I take time to pray, God blesses my days; when I don't take time to pray, I excel at making a fine mess.

Let's Pray:
God help us find time to pray, if not now, then when? Amen.

Today's Thought Is: Seek heaven first; everything else comes after that.

Dogged Optimist

Spying a flock of herring gulls standing on the low-tide beach, the dog would sprint right at them, his paws coming down hard on the packed wet sand, water and foam splashing, his tail flying straight out behind him like a banner of honor. They'd wait for him, watching his approach, talking among themselves, laughing really, and joking as herring gulls noisily do. They'd linger until the last moment and, then, leap together skyward, twirl once above his head, and finally fly off a distance, land in the sand, and wait for him to charge again. He'd chase all day, but never, not once, in ten years of trying, did he ever catch a single gull. Was he smart enough to understand the game? Every time he chased a flock, did he believe that, this time, he'd catch one? Whatever he thought, at the end of each exhausting run, he'd come home, his tail relaxed and wagging, with a smile on his snout. Chasing gulls made him happy. Maybe catching them never mattered to him. Maybe he just loved the process.

In the practice of the spiritual life, there is no catching heaven. It's always just out of reach. All we ever do is pursue it, learn to love the chase, and enjoy the quest.

Let's Pray:
Dear God, we ask that at the end of each day, our spiritual journey leaves usoptimistic and wanting more. Keep us tantalized. Amen.

Today's Thought Is: "Aim at Heaven and you will get Earth 'thrown in'; aim at Earth and you will get neither."

House on Ice

Long ago two brothers owned a house on the eastern side of Linekin Bay. They decided to move it to the western side. Small-minded folk scoffed. One cold winter the bay froze deep and solid. The brothers jacked up the house, put it on skids, and dragged it by oxen to the bay's edge. Each day they'd walk a couple dozen yards from the house, auger a hole in the ice, place in an anchor, and, using a block and tackle, would winch it and inch it westward. At day's end they'd hike home, eat dinner, and go to bed. The next day they'd rise with the winter sun, then repeat the process.

All winter the house sat and slid and sat and slid across the bay. Each day they hauled it closer to their goal. Before spring, they'd placed it on its new foundation. These men had faith -- in God, themselves, and the weather. They had a goal. They worked hard for their success and no doubt celebrated when they were done.

What's worth having is worth working toward. It may take daring. It may include risk. It certainly requires vision and hard work. No one succeeds without taking a chance. It may even look as foolish as working a house across a frozen bay seemed to many. Keeping faith in God is like this. It takes risk and work. It takes challenging cultural convention and being willing to be scoffed at, having a goal, being determined, and seeing what others can't.

Let's Pray:
God, keep us up to the challenge. Give us grace to stick to our faith and bestubborn enough to reach our goal. Amen.

Today's Thought Is: Keep your eye on the prize.

Barbie Lobster

It's not a killer outfit. The Barbie clothes kept this lobster alive since September. A blue Barbie blouse, a red-and-white-checkered skirt, and pink spike heels isn't normal autumn wear for a lobster living in the channel off Mount Desert Island, Maine. "You try squeezing Barbie shoes on a lobster," one lobsterman said. As a joke a couple of lobstermen drove over to Ellsworth, bought a Barbie outfit, later hauled up a friend's trap, dressed up a pound-and-a-half lobster, put the fancy "bug" back in the trap, and then reset it. Barbie Lobster was caught ten times but was always set free because of her sense of style. The last time she was caught she was a bit disheveled, with just her pink spike heels hanging on. If she survives the winter, local lobsterman have got her spring fashions ready to go.

Certainly, nobody mistook this crustacean for a real Barbie doll. (I probably didn't need to point that out.) However, sometimes the clothes or the coverings charlatans wear fool us all. We might be taken in by slick talk, apparent wealth, good looks, or our own dreams and weaknesses. The good Rabbi warns us about people purposefully disguising their true intentions while hoping to gobble us whole. Maybe they're after our savings account, maybe they want our virtue, maybe they want our minds and souls to control. He warns us to beware those false spiritual types who come disguised and prettified as harmless, but who are really sharp-clawed predators capable of tearing us apart.

Let's Pray:
Dear God, keep us safe from manipulators and con artists who prey on the meager means of the elderly and the souls of the innocent. Amen.

Today's Thought Is: A façade conceals intention.

Mirages

Do you remember the cartoon when Daffy Duck crawls in a desert gasping, "Water, water"? He spies water in a pool. Gulps it down. Spits it out. It's sand. Mirages aren't only in cartoons, or deserts. On hot summer days there are mirages of pools shimmering on our black-topped roadways. In winter, when seawater is warmer than cold air, we may see mirages of real islands suddenly floating above the ocean on cushions of sky. Deep-sea sailors tell tales of mirages, too. There are towering cities hovering on the horizon, always just out of reach, and there are ships that seemingly sail upside down

A mirage is a trick of physics. It's the refracting -- the bending -- of light through layers of hot and cold air. Although we can photograph mirages, they are illusions. They are not there.

God may seem like an illusion, a figment of imagination. God can't be seen. God can't be photographed. God can seem to be always out there, somewhere, just beyond reach. But unlike mirages, God is not a trick of the light. For those who have been touched by God, no vision -- no photo -- is necessary. For doubters, only proof will convince them.

That's too bad. There is no proof -- except ancient writings, millions of believers, and the human heart. It's in the heart, not the eye, where God is found. It's as the Teacher said, "Search, and you will find. Knock, and the door will be opened."

Let's Pray:
Dear God, sometimes we need a reminder of your living presence; s...