a numinous moment

art by Alona Frankel

It was a bright, glorious May day, one that only those who lived through the bitter New York winter deserve. The sky that had been grey and dreary for 6 months was sparkling blue. The scent of purple lilacs danced across the green lawn. I was 5 years old and had just finished my lunch. Dashing out the back door,  I looked for my mother who was hanging sheets that were flapping in the breeze. She heard the little song I was singing and turned. I asked if I could go play with my friend up the street and she smiled with such great warmth and said: Yes, and have fun."I carried the glow of that smile with me all day.

This is not a scene one would put in a novel, just an ordinary moment in a day but I have held it close for all these years. Somewhere in my life I understood the significance of the remembering.  It was because most of the other interactions were not as graced as this one. Often, they were with a curt reply or shrill yelling. This was affirmed for me when my daughter was taking a course in child psychology at Georgia State. In passing, she said that children remember the unusual, the rare occurrence, not the ordinary. Yes, the fall in the lake when I was 4, I recall vividly the colors and the fright. And this unusual day with that smile.All these years I have painted that shiny day with a grey brush wondering why it had to be the unusual and not the usual.Why hadn't I seen that loving smile more?

They say that, to have a desire for God, one must have had a numinous moment, a moment of grace in their lives. Now, in this place in my life, I choose to believe this: I know my mother loved me, she had a hard life and she gave me this one moment and showed me the love of God. It was enough.

Do not soil the moments..New Zealand

Dancer in a Floral Forest-Natalie Buske Thomas


Today's reading in Matthew speaks of loving your enemies. How impossible is that? How do we get there? The other day, out of nowhere, a thought came that might give me a clue to understand this unreachable command.

If I believe that the Creator forged and called into being the world and everything in it, that must include time.Yes, minutes, hours, this moment, this day, all time.And if that is the case, this minute belongs to Him. And? So if this is God's minute, how would He expect me to spend it? This may not be news to anyone but me, but it has changed my thinking so much.

The other day, I was expecting someone to come for the week-end for spiritual direction.When this dear soul comes, I try to have flowers in the room she uses.There were daffodils out there and I knew she would relish the bright yellow of these spring blessings. But I wanted to do something else. Then: if in fact, this is God's time, how would He have me spend it. Off I went to pick.

And if these minutes have been His all along and I am just gifted with them, wouldn't I be grateful in each of them? Yes, grateful.

The Welsh painter Gwen John said this after her conversion: "Every moment is holy. Do not soil the moments".Yes, so profound, so worthy of belief. What else do I need to know ?Well, I would need to know Him in some fashion to know what He expects me to do with this time. His Word, a raft in the middle of the churning ocean that I can hang onto.

Now picture this. I am a hater, filled with self loathing, standing in the doorway of a mosque. Hating myself is so unbearable, I have to send this burden elsewhere so I am here with my weapon. I will take control of life for a few minutes and destroy because that is the only thing that makes me feel larger than a flea.Then, a small whisper in my ear: "These few moments are mine. I am a Creator and I want you to be as well. I love you and all those around you.I have a better plan. Follow me."The prayers continue in the mosque, I wipe my tears away and walk slowly out into the sunshine.

Flower and black sky

Flower and Black Sky-Ken Kiff


What an odd painting.Take the flower out and what do you have? Night sky, dim moon and a bare lifeless tree.Who even notices flowers at night ?If your friend has a rose garden, do you pick up a flashlight and go look as you leave? No, you rush to the car to get out of the dark. Night is frightful.

The solitary flower reminds me of a touching O'Henry story, "The Last Leaf." I can see the lonely, swollen eyed woman in her 30s whose husband has just left her. She is lamenting as she gazes out the winter window to the tree that has lost all its leaves but one at the top. In her desperation she yells to the sky;" if that leaf is still there tomorrow, I will know that all is not lost."Her elderly, white haired upstairs neighbor has heard it all and when the apartment complex is in sleep mode, he creeps out with his ladder, climbs to the top of that tree and tightly ties the last leaf to the branch.This night's wind will not blow it away.

The next morning, she looks out to the miracle, her leaf clings, she will be O.K. She will also find out later that the old man was found under tree where he had fallen to his death.

Another movie scene comes to mind: in the movie "Unbroken", we visit the story of an Olympic runner of the 1936 Olympics who winds up in the Air Force in World War 2.In 1943, His plane is shot down, he spends 47 days alone on a raft and when rescued, it is by Japanese forces who put him in a prison in Tokyo.The men there are starved, beaten and Loius Zamperini, being an American sports hero, is singled out for special cruelty. He survives unbroken. But is he ?

The movie sequel "Unbroken, Road to Redemption" shows life after he gets home: no job, anger boiling over his treatment, sleepless, nightmare filled nights and then heavy drinking.But he goes to a Billy Graham Crusade and finally, finally let's the Light in. Let's Christ into his heart.He is transformed.

In 1950, he goes back to Japan to that same camp where now his former tormentors are kneeling on the floor, heads bowed, captives themselves. In a touching moment, one of the kneeling men looks up and Louis slowly goes to him, lifts him up and says," It's O.K. It's O.K.", then another , then another until he has assured each man of his forgiveness in these simple words; "It's O.K."

To the lonely girl on the playground, It's O.K.", From a Grandma baking biscuits, the auntie giving love, the ancestors paying visits, "It's O.K."

That is what that small purple flower whispers:" It's O.K. It will always be O.K."