Pages of the Odyssey

It was during the final summer of my time as pastor of a church plant in Illinois.  I preached a message one Sunday in which I reflected on the Christian life being akin to the journey taken by Homer's Odysseus.  All along the way he encountered different characters, various villains, tests, and trials which all helped to do two things:  Reveal his character, and refine his character.

Though I preached that sermon as a message to all of us, it was especially ringing true to me as I had spent the previous few months feeling strongly that I was being drawn into an odyssey that I had not anticipated.  And my own odyssey would serve the same purposes.  A couple of months later I preached my final sermon and within days was surrounded by strangers living in a strange city ten hours away.

It's been about three years since I preached that message.  It has indeed been quite an odyssey.  All of the weaknesses of my character have been revealed.  About a year and a half into the odyssey I left the strange city and came into what I anticipated to be a familiar port.  I had sailed this way before and it had been a five-year port-of-call before leaving to plant our church.  I anticipated all of the familiar faces of friends.  And I had hoped that my arrival back in this familiar place would end the strangeness of my odyssey and allow me to settle back into a normal, pleasant, predictable way of life.

The odyssey continued.

I found this place to be much different from when I left it.  Or, perhaps, it was I who was much different.  I believe it was both.  The faces were familiar, but the voices seemed to have changed.  The relationships I once enjoyed and looked forward to resuming had become strangely disfigured.  And the role I thought I would play in the lives of those around me, in the highways and byways of the city, turned out to be the thing of unfulfilled dreams.

This blog became a chronicle of my odyssey in this place.  If you dig back through the pages you'll find the writings of a man lost in a familiar place.  You'll hear the frustration of a man waking up to find all of the furniture had been rearranged in the night.  You'll read the words of a man who had forgotten his own identity.  Most of all you'll read the thoughts of a man longing for the kindness of God in a strangely foreign, dry and thirsty land where springs of cool, clear water used to abound.

A few months ago I laid down the pen.  I had finally given up on my pursuit of the kindness of God, settled for exile, and turned my attention elsewhere.  Today I am taking the pen back in my hand.  In the last few weeks I have come to see that this odyssey has been God's pursuit of me more than my pursuit of God.  And it is through the revealing and refining of my character that God has shouted his love and kindness to me.

To those of you who have remained as subscribers to this blog, I hope you'll rejoin me as important characters in my odyssey.  Perhaps I can serve as an important character in yours.  In taking up the pen again, I considered going back and deleting many of the posts that reveal the darker facets of my character that have been most in need of refining.  But I quickly realized that there would be no integrity in doing so.  They are important pages of the odyssey and the story is incomplete and incoherent without them.

I look forward to resuming with you the journey forward into the kindness of God.

Comments

[Bill Huffhine]

Myles,

Thank you so much. That was a wonderful blessing. It meant a lot that you would think to offer it to me.

Deep in the past posts you'll find several that I wrote in reflection of Celtic spirituality. A wonderful way of walking with and worshiping the saviour!

[Myles]

An Irish blessing for you, from Roma Downey and Phil Coulter:

May the blessing of light be upon you
Light on the outside and light on the inside
With God's sunlight shining on you,
May your heart glow with warmth like a turf fire
That welcomes friends and strangers alike.

May the light of the Lord shine from your eyes
like a candle in the window,
welcoming the weary traveler.

May the blessing of God's soft rain be on you
Falling gently on your head
refreshing your soul with the sweetness
of little flowers newly blooming.

May the strength of the winds of heaven bless you,
carrying the rain to wash your spirit clean
sparkling after, in the sunlight.

May the blessing of God's earth be on you
and as you walk the roads, may you always
have a kind word for those you meet.

May you understand the strength and power
of God in a thunderstorm in Winter,
the quiet beauty of creation and the calm of a Summer sunset.

And may you come to realize that insignificant
as you may seem in this great universe,
you are an important part of God's plan.

May He watch over you and keep you safe from harm.