Who are we?

I've come to really appreciate my mornings here. Right here.

I listened to Elizabeth Gilbert talk the other day about writing as a form of prayer and meditation. She described how her mind, in writing, escaped a lot of the noise of the world. It allowed her to connect with parts of herself she couldn't discover outside of writing.

That resonated with me.

I think it's helpful for us all to have that place. Maybe it's writing or drawing or walking or prayer and meditation itself. I believe we all have to have a place to discover the mystery of who we are.

I think in many ways we are all walking around in this noisy life craving a moment of silence to explore the question: who am I?

I would also argue, that much of the noise going on in the world is really the world asking the question: who are we?

As a people, who are we and what do we stand for? Oh, it's a question that plays out in arguments and strong opinions and television commercials and often doesn't even look like a question at all.

But it's a question. Don't be fooled. The world is constantly asking out loud, who are we?

I think that question best gets answered when we offer each other views into who we really are as individuals. Not who we are in the noise of the day, in a world that pressures us to dress like this and talk like that, but who we are in those quiet moments of life. Who we are when we are most honestly answering that question about ourselves: who am I?

I come here most mornings with the window wide open, giving you a look at the mystery of God's presence in my life. I don't do it nearly as much to make the mysteries of my life the mysteries of your life, but far more to simply encourage you to explore you own mysteries.

And share them.

My mysteries have been influenced most by people who share with me the answers to their question: who am I?

I think people coming together, allowing each other to have windows into each other's answers, has a powerful influence on the direction the answer to 'who are we' goes.

There are a lot of movements and heated opinions out there about what the answer to 'who are we' should be. They all have a meaningful place in this world. But I think we often skip over the part of looking inside each other's windows to get right to what should be happening outside of them.

I think that's often because we don't stop and get quiet long enough to figure out what's inside our windows. I think the noise of the world screaming at us about who we should be as a people holds us back from exploring who we truly are as an individual.

I just think it would be helpful, especially now that the weather is warming a bit, if everyone would just open their windows a bit. Let the breeze in. Let each other in.