city lights at night

I was reminded last night as I watched 'the Hour' on CBC of something I have been thinking about for a while. George ST., the host, was telling a story about how he was driving through the desert and about to run out of gas. He had no clue of where he was. His only choice was to follow the road ahead of him. The fear and sense of impending doom of being stranded in a desert with no gas became overwhelming and suddenly....he saw lights-dim lights in the distance . Having grown up in a Christian home he thought, perhaps it is a dream, perhaps I am going 'home'. He continued to head toward the light, but instead of finding Jesus as the source of the light-he found Las Vegas.

How long has it been since your last authentic, bonified spiritual experience? An experience so clear, and definitely the almighty that it stands out to you like a light along, your darkened desert path. If it has been a while you may be thinking, what have i done wrong, where did God go? I think as Christians we think that such experiences should be the norm. In fact, we talk candidly about God speaking to us, and say things like 'God told me.' We can string a line of great moments in life, together in such a way that we sound like we should be on a mega tour as an amazing spiritual giant, but in reality they probably have occur over years and years. There is for me always space, sometimes long spaces between experiences.

I need to remember that although God may speak and I may even see angels-the Christian life is not like heaven on earth. Christians do not have 24-7 Moses in the cloud experiences. The pursuit of such super spirituality may even be counter to God's purposes.

More often, I like George find myself on a road, running out of gas, in the dark with only the road ahead and a light in the distance. Just as cities in Europe have a lot of road between pilgrimage destinations and holy places, our lives may have a lot of space between definable spiritual experiences. The great thing is, no matter how long the interval between us and our next spiritual experience, there is both a light in the distance and an assurance that the road we are on will get us there.