Touched by Grace

How wonderful that the planners of this conference recognized the importance of both participating in and experiencing from the pews the various services in the week of learning how to weave theology with music and art in significant ways. The preacher of the week, the Rev. John Buchanan, editor, author and pastor of the Fourth Presbyterian Church in Chicago Illinois, was a challenging and engaging speaker.

We laugh with him as he pointed out truths we would need to wrestle with. So much swirls through my head. I am changing almost hourly. I can feel myself stretching, questioning, growing. I love singing for the services the mixed choir ministers in. I love sitting in the pews and partaking while other choirs of the week - bell, women's, and youth - minister to us.

I can't recall any other time in my life when I have worshiped formally twice a day with full communion served - and communion with wine, I might add. Its enough to make your head swim. Today, I once again join the line of people going forward to take communion. I feel the presence of God, the sacredness of this privilege. I am in awe. I partake, wondering if those offering the elements know how special this activity is. I think they do not see how un mundane, how amazing, how ethereal this communion is. Do they know they offer a taste of the divine?

God must be wondering how many times he has to touch me before I respond to his love. How many sips of communion before I allow the warmth to flood my soul and heal my hurts? I return to my seat and suddenly I am overwhelmed by his love. I can't really describe it, but it undoes me completely. The tears stream down my face and I don't care if others see it and wonder what is the matter with me.

I am unaware of anything except the tremendous amazing touch of Christ, of his sorrow about the cancer I have been battling, of his sympathy about the difficult treatment and the draining side effects, of his desire that I be whole and well. He loves me despite my shortcomings, despite the hard places in my heart, despite my own lack of love towards his children. He loves me completely without reservation. He loves me right now, before I become something a bit more acceptable to his life style and expectations.

It is as if I have been immersed in a soothing warm liquid of joy where I am cared for to the nth degree, beyond anything I have ever thought possible. I can feel the scars shrinking, the holes being filled in with sound flesh and living tissue. I revel in it. I embrace it. I thank God. I sit there for as long as it lasts, not caring if I am late for rehearsal or anything else for that matter.

I do not want this touch of grace to end. But slowly the walls of Boe Cathedral reappear. Slowly I come up out of the pool of God's grace like a pampered diva from a day at the spa. I sit there for long minutes recovering from the extraordinary, gaining my bearings, not wanting to leave but knowing that I will.

O Lord, touch me again. Touch my heart often. More. More. And please touch all my friends and family too.