I didn’t know how lost until last Sunday.

Since our move to Colorado, Suzy and I have not attended church. We miss our FUMCR connection and the weekly buzz we got by attending and participating in all of the doings of the church. So last week we decided we would try out a church, and picked Vail Church, which is about 20 miles away in Eagle-Vail.

Saturday night I received a call from friends asking me to play golf with them early Sunday morning. We knew it was going to be a beautiful morning and by playing early I would be done with plenty of time to work on all of the unopened moving boxes in the garage. Pretty tempting. Now my friends were not doing the devil’s work, they were just being friends. But something clicked in my mind and I said no, I was going to church.

We woke up Sunday and headed to church about a 20 minute drive away, same as the drive we had for FUMCR.

Pulled up and the parking lot was jammed. Walked in and saw people of all ages in all kinds of attire, from dressy to casual. I could definitely wear shorts to church in the summer.

Sat down and began to read the bulletin. I couldn’t because I was starting to see white spots on the page… a migraine was coming on. I knew it was the devil trying to attack me. I remembered Suzy was drinking a Diet Coke on the way and asked her if she had finished it, she said she hadn’t. I asked if she had any chocolate, another way I overcome migraines (isn’t God good), when she reminded me there was migraine medicine in the car. I ran out and took 2 migraine pills and a couple of slugs of caffeine from the Diet Coke which also works on my migraines. I got back inside just in time to hear the start of the first song. It was an old revival song that had recently been released by a contemporary Christain group.

My tears started immediately.

I felt the presence of the Holy Spirit moving within this congregation.

The second song was “Holy is the Lord God Almighty”. I had been singing that tune off and on for the prior 2 weeks. I continued to cry.

The third song was “Indescribable”. The words were projected above the singers making it easy to sing along. The words were just beautiful…

“From the highest of heights to the depths of the sea
Creation’s revealing Your majesty
From the colors of fall to the fragrance of spring
Every creature unique in the song that it sings
All exclaiming

Indescribable, uncontainable,

You placed the stars in the sky and You know them by name.
You are amazing God

All powerful, untameable,
Awestruck we fall to our knees as we humbly proclaim
You are amazing God”

As many times as I had heard this song, I had never focused on the words before. The tears continued to come.

The next song was “Amazing Grace”.

 “I was lost, but now I’m found”

How I kept from falling I do not know.

The sermon was given by Reverend Craig Smith from the Book of Daniel. He talked throughout the sermon about personal accountability, about not getting into yourself, about admitting before God your personal sins and releasing them to God. I was taking notes, this was really wonderful stuff. And as I listened, I heard Suzy crying quietly beside me.

I took my pen and wrote her a note that said: “I think we have found our church home?”

She shook her head yes.

We introduced ourselves at the end of the service and volunteered. We didn’t tell him what we wanted to do nor did we expect anything. We just wanted to say we were ready to serve, that God moved our hearts and we were ready again as we were at FUMCR.

BTW: Craig Smith’s sermons can be found at www.thevailchurch.com. I am going to listen to some of them over the coming days. He also tells great jokes, just like Clayton Oliphint at FUMCR. In fact we are going to send the joke he told on Sunday to Clayton. I had not heard it before. I’m still giggling about it.

On Life

I have not been writing much for the Rocky Mountain Climbing Diary lately. I can blame the move, the lack of time to concentrate to meditate and allow God to enter my thoughts and for those thoughts to generate writing.

I feel a little cut adrift from many of my sources of inspiration: my church, my Emmaus group, teaching Disciple bible cases, attending Choices Stretches and more. So far we have not connected spiritually with a fellowship or church. I met a really neat couple on the plane to Miami last week and they knew a few people in Vail Valley who were churchgoers and they are getting us together. I am hopeful this will lead to new God adventures and guidance.

I have been doing a fair amount of reading to “make up” for this obvious lack in my life right now. This has been really wonderful for when I am absorbed in Christ oriented material I am ported away to a better life only available through belief and faith.

But I am not unhappy. I look out the window of my house and see the mountains that so attracted me for so long and I shake in disbelief that I am actually living here. Then in the cool of the nights I can look up and see an uncountable number of stars and then I know for sure that God put me here to experience just that feeling. What He still has in store for me I am unsure, but His pace is allowing me to get my household and business in shape for His next challenge.

One thought has been running through my mind for a month or two. I was able to share it with my good friend Kevin Henderson on a drive to Denver we did together.

My thoughts we about life.

These thoughts were made clearer upon the death of Melinda Shipman, a friend of ours for the last few years who took our Disciple bible classes. You may recall that Suzy and I were asked to speak at her memorial service.

I am so sure that Melinda is in heaven now that it has given me a different perspective of life. Since I believe the Bible tells me that death leads to eternal life for those that believe, then Melinda is only dead to us. We can no longer see the shell she inhabited here on this level of God’s creation. Melinda always exuded a grace that I have seen in few people. Her radiance, here, was always very clear to me. I have a clear vision that as believers, as we die, which is the only definition we have for our brains to understand, as we leave the shell God has given us, we change to God’s vision of us and it is radiant. This radiance is so bright that we mere mortals can not see the transformation and the ascendance.

I even think this belief is Biblical. When Moses came down from the mountain after being with God it was said his face shone with such radiance that he went a long time with his head covered. Jesus upon his transfiguration and Stephen speaking to the Sanhedrin prior to his stoning were also examples of God’s radiance being experienced by man.

I wish we had a different way to express this transformation; unfortunately I have no idea how to do so. But I think I know life better as a result of this understanding. Life really isn’t here. Life really only truly begins in faith and death. In faith we become a little like God. In death we move even closer to God though our faith. Time is no longer of any importance. If we wish to know more about the rings of Saturn, we go there and become a ring. For as part of God’s glory and universe we can see all that He has made. When I thought of this capability we will receive upon our faith, death, transformation and ascendance, I finally understood Mark, Chapter 10, Verses 28-31, that our new self will receive “A hundred-fold” what we experienced on this world.

Now, as much as my heart still aches for Melinda and all of the other dear friends and family who have radiantly ascended to be at the hand of God, I am less tearful and more filled with joy for their crossing into the next realm of everlasting forgiveness and beauty. And, where God will wipe away every tear.

And maybe that is what I am to write about.