Through Painted Deserts, Part 2

Our road trip is complete. My reading of Donald Miller's book, Through Painted Deserts: Light, God and Beauty on the Open Road is complete. I didn't realize this when I started the book, but his story ended in the same city our road trip ended in. Perhaps it was meant to be that this was my chosen road trip book, and perhaps I needed these reminders.

If you recall from Part 1, the introduction emphasized the theme of leaving. Read Part 1 Here

During his journey, Donald ponders a good deal about the idea of security and the feelings created by society and advertisers. His travel companion, Paul, seems to take things in stride and live unaffected by others and this intrigues him. He questions things. How does a person stop caring about the opinion of others? How does a person stop caring about money to pay rent? Where will the food come from? Do I sound like an idiot when I speak in public? Do people like me? Donald's questioning resonates with me. 

Life can be about the panic of having the right things, knowing the right people, etc. or it can be about the beauty in the sunrises, the glory of leaves changing colors, fresh air, and people. He had this to say about his friend, "Paul had become a human who no longer believed the commercials are true, which, perhaps, is what a human was designed to be."

Two options: 
1. "You will feel what you were made to feel if you buy this thing I am selling."




2. "Feel what a human is supposed to feel when he stops believing lies. And maybe when a person doesn't buy the lies anymore, when a human stops long enough to realize the stuff people say to get us to part with our money often isn't true, we can finally see the sunrise, smell the wetness in a Gulf breeze, stand in awe at a downpour no less magnificent than a twenty-thousand-foot waterfall, ten square miles wide, wonder at the physics of a duck paddling itself across the surface of a pond, enjoy the reflection of the sun on the face of the moon, and know, This is what I was made to do. This is who I was made to be, that life is being given to me as a gift, that light is a metaphor, and God is doing these things to dazzle us."

One More Thing...

Maybe this pilgrimage we're on really IS in God's hands and He is simply waiting for us to let him take control. I believe that. Go watch a sunrise or sunset. Go stand where the ocean meets the sand. Go stand in the rain. Go stare up at the trees...and let go.

Take care, and I'm always here to pray for you if you have a need or request.
Lois Lynn