Desert Journal - Entry 2

Brothers of the monastery,

Revelation of sheer silence

1 Kings 19:11-12

"He said, 'Go out and stand on the mountain before the Lord, for the Lord is about to pass by.' Now there was a great wind, so strong that it was splitting mountains and breaking rocks in pieces before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind, and after the wind an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake; and after the earthquake a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire; and after the fire a sound of sheer silence."

Yes dear brothers, how often have we dwelled on the mundane, fretting over lamp oil -- thoughts of dry oil lamps, thoughts of dark cubicles without a ray of light to illuminate our precious tomes -- oh, the travails of the temporal world! And look! Already I've traveled these desert climes, without so much as an ounce of our precious lamp oil. Oh, I lament, for we too often create our own tiny worlds, trifling worlds that soon fill to excess, so much so that we are blinded to God's world. Open your eyes dear brothers, step back, vacate yourselves from your cubicles, trek into the world as God created it, shed yourselves of your lifetime of accumulations, listen to Jesus as he tries so hard to open our eyes: "... consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin, yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these." Oh my dear brothers, the machinations of the present age are futile, all our attempts to create a better world are but illusions, because all the attempts "are ours"!

I must close now, for the desert winds do howl, and this telephone booth does make a poor abode, but thanks to Bro. Simon for loaning me his laptop, for the technology does permit us to be together in thoughts, yet we must remember that the technology is but a temporal convenience, a convenience that is but like the wind, it roars and shakes mankind, but God is not there -- God abides in His creations, not ours.

Brother Bartleby