C.S. Lewis - On the present moment

This is one of those things I try to share with my Christian Service Classes... I usually use a Tolstoy short story.  Here Lewis captures it well.  This is from a daily C.S. Lewis reading I recently subscribed to through Bible Gateway... thanks to seeing it from Rev. David Meggers on Facebook.

Never, in peace or war, commit your virtue or your happiness to the future. Happy work is best done by the man who takes his long-term plans somewhat lightly and works from moment to moment “as to the Lord.” It is only our daily bread that we are encouraged to ask for. The present is the only time in which any duty can be done or any grace received.

From The Weight of Glory

The Broken Spirit Bead

I like this reading from Plough this morning.  It reminds me of the quilters who intentionally leave a flaw in their work.  I guess the idea is broader than I knew... -drs

Rachel Naomi Remen

The marks life leaves on everything it touches transform perfection into wholeness. Older, wiser cultures choose to claim this wholeness in the things that they create. In Japan, Zen gardeners purposefully leave a fat dandelion in the midst of the exquisite, ritually precise patterns of the meditation garden. In Iran, even the most skilled of rug weavers includes an intentional error, the “Persian Flaw,” in the magnificence of a Tabriz or Qashqai carpet…and Native Americans wove a broken bead, the “spirit bead,” into every beaded masterpiece. Nothing that has a soul is perfect. When life weaves a spirit bead into your very fabric, you may stumble upon a wholeness greater than you had dreamed possible before.

Source: My Grandfather’s Blessings