Like an open book

I've been unsure whether to blog about one of the things I'm doing now. I've joined a thirty-week "retreat" doing the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius (there's a nice explanation here). This is a huge commitment for me and while I am very excited about it, I am also rather overwhelmed by the time and emotional energy that it takes. I think I've been afraid to write about it here because a) it might seem like bragging or some weird contorted emotion like that, b) I probably won't be able to write much about what I'll be going through in the retreat anyway, and c) it's always scary to admit that I'm attempting some new level of discipline (what if I fail?).

Today, though, I was really moved by an experience with God that came while working on my exercises for this week and I wanted to write about it. Part of this week's instructions called for me to pray to see what were the major turning points of my life, as if through the eyes of God (and through the lens of having meditated on Psalm 139).

Well, I've read Psalm 139 plenty of times - "you formed me in my mother's womb" and all that. Today though, as I sat outside my favorite coffee shop nursing a latte, I observed the world right around me. I looked at the tree leaves wiggling in the breeze and watched a pigeon with a shimmering purple collar walk around my feet looking for crumbs. I listened to the sounds - the snatches of conversations as people walked by, the intermittent bird-song-like chirping of the cross-walk beeper, the car noises of brakes and gears shifting and tires on pavement. I felt the warmth of my coffee cup in my hand and the lovely, almost bitter taste of the drink in my mouth. All these things of creation speak to me of a wonderful and loving God. When I have a hard time believing in God, I look at these things and their complexity and beauty and I find my faith renewed.

As I thought about different major events in my life, I asked God to give me the eyes to see them as He did. While I have known intellectually that He was there throughout my life, I haven't always known it emotionally. What does God see as the major turning points in my life?

This is when I suddenly had one of "those" kind of moments, one of those mysterious experiences of the supernatural. All of a sudden the picture in front of me didn't fit together any more. The cars were driving by, but they didn't make sense. People were talking, but I couldn't quite understand them. It was as if all of life was like one of those mosaics of tile that come attached to a canvas backing and suddenly the tiles got up and danced around a bit, then didn't quite fit back together again the way they had before.

I realized that in the past when I have tried to see that God was with me throughout my life, I have looked at my life through my own memories and impressions, and tried to superimpose an understanding of God being there and his love for me on those memories. What I feel like God was inviting me to do today was to let my understanding be shaped by his view of my life, to let him shake things up a little. Not to negate my memories, but to allow him to enhance (and maybe complete) them. To accept that sometimes, what I thought was a known picture of events might turn out to fit together a little differently than I remembered. I feel like I was invited to peer into God's memory scrapbook, to see my story from his point of view.

Like an open book,
you watched me grow from conception to birth;
all the stages of my life were spread out before you

Wow.