consulting your spiritual compass

Salvador Dali, "The Persistence of Memory"

Oil on canvas, 9 1/2 x 13" (24.1 x 33 cm). © 2007 Salvador Dalí,

Gala-Salvador Dalí Foundation/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

Every Monday at work I have the privilege of participating in a lunch-time prayer group where we meet to pray for one another as well as our unchurched colleagues. It is a small group: there are usually 3-5 of us. It's remarkable to me that at a corporate campus of 2,000 that 3 is the most we can often muster, but such is the lot of those heeding the call to the Special Forces of prayer.

Beyond the privilege of participating in this group on a regular basis I have the additional privilege of offering a short devotional to begin these sessions. This past Monday I took a few moments to share how significant my personal commitment to the weekly readings of the Revised Common Lectionary has been in terms of deepening my relationship with the Lord and setting direction for my own life and ministry.

In my former missionary ministry we wrote monthly newsletters to our ministry partners. One of my favorites was from the very first year of our ministry, in which we were trying to raise funds and recruit a team before venturing off to language school to learn some Russian. I entitled that newsletter "The M-68", which referred to my personal spiritual compass. It was named 'M-68' after Micah 6:8: "He has shown you, O Man, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you, but to do justice, to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God."

A world which is confused, distracted, and lost desperately needs people who know who they are and where they are going.

What is the model number of your spiritual compass? How regularly do you consult it? If you have misplaced it, need to dust it off, or even need to file a claim for a loss, might a commitment to the four simple weekly readings of the Revised Common Lectionary set this compass front and center once again, or even for the first time?

Remember this as well: the point of Bible reading is not to know the Bible, but rather to know the Lord, and his calling on your life. One of the great challenges and blessings of the lectionary for me is that because the weekly readings are limited, there is time and space to ask, "Father, what do you want to do with this in my life today?" It is this step of reverent submission (as the author of Hebrews puts it in a recent reading) that brings power to the words on the page.

Let us today check our course and set sail into the destiny our Father has for us.

doing good and helping the poor

Repin, "The Volga Boatman"

Fourth Sunday of Easter - April 29, 2007
Acts 9:36-43

Apart from the fact that Peter resurrected her from the dead, what strikes me about this passage is who Dorcas was: someone "who was always doing good and helping the poor." So many of us have our focus only on our careers: we want to be known as someone "who had an important management job". Is this really a worthy calling? Who will care once you retire? I can name the current CEO of my company and with effort can recall the name of the former CEO. Yet rather than being a CEO, I would much rather be counted in the company of Dorcas. No wonder Peter made a special trip to bring her back for a second round of joyful service.

I feel great joy when I think about the good we were able to do as missionaries in Siberia, and the good we are continuing to try to do there while now living stateside. I feel great joy when I think about taking my sons out two Saturdays ago for Scouting for Food, and being part of a record gathering of food for the hungry.

I often feel that I'm not doing enough good or doing very much to help the poor. I could do more, and by God's grace, I will. Yet in reflecting on what I have done, I can see that it's not that hard to do something, and in this I rejoice. Might all of us have the joy of doing something good this week, and helping even one among the poor.