WHO ME?

You’re talking to me, Lord?

Sorry. I wasn’t paying attention. Again.

I was distracted. Off in my own little world. 

You say you’re always trying to get through to me--

that no matter who or what I’m dealing with--

you can teach me something about life, about love--

something good, something grand, something giving?

(That assumes, of course, that I will press my pause button

long enough to let you back into my world--but then, 

that’s the point you’re trying to make here, right?)

You’re saying, every time I notice something that inspires me,

that’s you trying to get my attention,

every time I see someone do something kind 

or compassionate, that’s you again,

every time my heart swells with joy or thankfulness, that’s you.

I'm beginning to see things a little more clearly now.

Beginning to get you. Beginning to let you. Again.

Beginning to see the price of my cluelessness,

and just how meager I make your magnificent world,

and just how blind I am to what I don’t want to see.

(I’m so into myself, my own warp and woof--but then, 

that’s the other point you’re trying to make here, right?)

Thank you for these moments, painful though they be, 

for breaking through my thick-as-a-brick ego;

for helping me see that I take far more for granted

than I receive with gratefulness;

for helping me get how I limit your word, your wisdom, your will,

just by not listening to, not looking for, not expecting you 

to be right here, in the very place I’m at,

right now, in the very situation I'm in.

This poem is based on a story in Genesis 28 about a moment in the life of Jacob, one of the Old Testament patriarchs, where he comes to the transformative conclusion that, “Surely the Lord is in place and I did not know it.”