Extremes

It is easy to add a bit of fuel to evil; it is giving permission, power, and energy to what is already ready to explode.  It may seem strange anyone longing for a simplistic world in which the surface peace we thirst for is supreme.  Yet peace isn’t all that it seems, it is both more and less.  And, evil lives on, finding its home in your heart and mine.  Before one protests too much, take the opportunity to reflect in the quietness of the night, on what could, might, or should have been since one’s last reflection. 
 
Extremes are neither good nor bad; they simply are.  We have moments of greatness – found in simple things as well as complex.  It could be the simple process of friends hanging a set of French doors or it could be two meeting through music and the moments captured in pictures.  Within the ebbs and flows of life we find the best and worst of our souls.  If we muster the courage to invite the Spirit of reflection magical things can happen! 
 
As I walk the streets of New York’s lower east side I find myself weaving in and through the extremes of life; rich, poor, compassionate and bigoted, considerate and greedy.  It is as if a parody of life’s edges if being played out for one’s amusement.  Even as I watched friends edging each other on, some to unfortunate excess, I was reminded of one writer’s notation in times long past; “And now watch this: against Babylon, I'm inciting the Medes, a ruthless bunch indifferent to bribes, the kind of brutality that no one can blunt.” (Isaiah 13.17) 
 
If I want to be part of something special, of life’s moments of compassion, engagement, and wonder, I need to understand my current abode and move to the extreme of my heart’s desire.  For each it will be different; for me it is the Spirit pursuit of God’s heart.  I know, believe, and walk in faith of this extreme.  It’s a long way off, reach by one choice after another.