“The gate of heaven is everywhere.”

—Thomas Merton

Maybe like me you woke up Sunday morning feeling deep unease. The world feels as if it is coming undone. The reality is every single day we can experience heaven and hell outside us (inside us too!). We choose if we meet the day from a posture of fear or hope. (I can do both!)

I took a trip to England to visit C.S. Lewis’s home last fall. One morning jogging along the Thames River I came upon an older gentleman in a plaid cap, boots up to his knees, metal detector in hand, scanning the mud flats for treasure. I called out to him as one might to a fisherman with a line in the water. “Found anything?” He responded. “Every single day.”

I smiled.  “Every single day.” It was a divine directive.

Hidden in plain sight, in our ordinary lives, pearls of hope are everywhere. Like that jolly “saint on the bank of the Thames,” we must daily commit to looking for God in our messy, unpredictable lives. We must become collectors of light so the darkness can’t overtake us. Coming alive to the splendor all around us is an antidote to despair.

It is mind, body, spirit and soul WORK to notice and share the beauty eclipsing the ugly and dark, the pure goodness of the human heart opposing the presence of evil, and God working everywhere! But don’t you want to be that person?

In my experience, hope is subtle, more breadcrumbs than banquet feasts. Join me in looking for the divine clues where God is moving in your life and mine, speaking in the small moments of beauty, connection, redemption, love and sometimes even the miraculous.

I am signing off for a summer sabbatical. I wish you a blessed summer looking for pearls everywhere!

Live with hope,

Farrell