[reflection after attending the 2006 MLK celebration at Saint Paul AME Church, Fayetteville, TN]

We know, O God, that each of us has within our beings an Egypt, wilderness, and Promise Land; places we can leave from and return to. Most of the time we can manage to avoid returning to our own internal Egypt, O Lord, but getting out of the wilderness proves much more difficult.

We know, O God, that you are not only a God who promises to care for us and provide comfort in the hereafter, but you are also a God who calls us to seek and desire, in this world, the places and ways that you have put in our hearts for us to be here after.

As a culture, we are marginally proficient at rescuing others from Pharaoh’s brickyards, though Katrina pulled back the curtain and exposed the smoke-screen and hypocrisy of our Oz-like wizardry. Many of us in the middle have been fed with the bland repetition of quail and manna for so long, that we have been dulled to the promise and taste of anything better.

Give us, this day, O God, a hunger and desire to be nourished by the giant, juicy figs of your Spirit, and to have our thirst quenched by the refreshment of your honey-sweetened milk. Show us, together, how to journey from the wilderness of the present, into the Promise Land of hope.

As the hymnist intoned (second verse from Camp NaCoMe):

Lord prepare us to be a sanctuary
pure and holy, tried and true.
With thanksgiving, we’ll be a living
sanctuary for you.

Teach your children to stop their fighting
and start uniting, all as one.
Let’s get together, and be forever
a sanctuary, for you.

© 2006 Todd Jenkins