Mahalia and the Lava Lamps

I bought some Lava Lamps the other day for an upcoming project.  We're "trying them out" at home to make sure they work OK.  They do, but they are excruciatingly slow to get going!  The "lava" blobs inside don't even begin to move until at least an hour after I first flip the switch.  Once they do, though, they still move pretty slowly up and down in the lighted liquid.  They're soothing to watch - kind of like a jellyfish sarabande - but I find that since there is no FastForward button, I have to devote some considerable time to watching them.


This past week I also found a YouTube video of Mahalia Jackson singing The Lord's Prayer on the last night of the Newport Jazz Festival in 1958 (check it out for yourself).  The audience sat in rapt attention as she sang/prayed this prayer (that normally takes us, what, 20 seconds to say?) for nearly four minutes!  I know, four minutes doesn't seem like a long time, but it is over ten times the amount of time we normally take when we simply speak it (even in church)! 


I guess this is all just to say that some things are worth slowing down for.  Some things are worth the time because they aren't made to happen instantly.  Some days I feel like my spiritual journey is too much like those lava lamps - I want to "make progress" a lot faster than I seem to be going.  And then there are those days when I realize that my spiritual journey is not so much about a destination as it is about a slow dance in a confined space with my Father who is absolutely, unconditionally in love with me.  And even though most days I zoom through the Lord's Prayer in near-record time, I think I also need to learn that the point of the Prayer is not so much in the saying of it as in the time spent in the presence of the Father.


Thanks for taking the time to read this - but now, please go spend some time doing a slow dance with the Father.