Why indeed? Have you counted how many times you've asked that question along the way of your journey?

I can't say for certain what the event was that triggered this message in Revelation to the church at Ephesus. But I know there was some form of discouragement. You can feel it lying just beneath the words; "You walked away…"

With every tick of the clock we are somewhere along the road on our journey to God. Sooner or later, and usually more than once, we arrive at Ephesus, that place of discouragement. Sometimes I think Ephesus is my home town. In a strange sort of way it is, or at least it is a town that I seem to always be returning to, or passing by on my onward and upward journey. Ephesus, it seems is always, just around the corner, somehow always tempting you and me to "walk away".

Certainly there are times, events, situations that need to be walked away from in order to escape Ephesus, but we should never walk away from our journey toward God.

Revelation 2:17 – Are your ears awake? Listen. Listen to the Wind Words, the Spirit blowing through the churches. I'm about to call each conqueror to dinner. I'm spreading a banquet of Tree-of-Life fruit, a supper plucked from God's orchard. (MSG)

Prayer: Lord, help us to understand the places we are at in all our journeys this day, particularly if we find our feet in Ephesus. Amen.

Don't get me wrong, I enjoy sledding the net (Surfing isn't an appropriate term where I live), but have you noticed how noisy it is? The net seems to me visually loud in the extreme. Bright colours, big bold letters, winking and blinking icons. The closest I've come to a quiet glade and still waters is a plain grey home page with a traditional typeset.

Contrast this with last night. I was driving home from meetings down south. It was after midnight and I'd been driving for about seven hours. The sky was moonless and clear, which means a billion stars shone all around. Fresh snow added to the brightness. I drove with the headlights off for a while. The outside temperature gauge said -37, Celsius or Fahrenheit, at that temperature, it just doesn't matter which.

I stopped on top of a ridge, right on what passes for the Trans-Canada Highway, turned off the van and hopped out. Reaching up I could almost touch the Northern Lights dancing all around. And I mean "all around", not some fuzzy patch of lime-green light off to the north.

At -37, and below (-70 is awesome!), there is a silence that is only heard out here in the world beyond the cities and the towns. You don't have to do anything to "Be still and know". The frozen stillness swallows you up whole, and the Northern Lights and stars fill you with the depth of infinity, the hand of God.

Prayer: Lord, help us to be still. Then fill us with deep peace. Amen.