Wannabe Inn

Wannabe Inn faces the south with a porch overlooking the lake.  Beyond the lake stretching to the south and east is Wannabe forest - one of the few remaining virgin hardwood forests not ravaged by fire, people, or disease.  Its beauty crowns the foothills and ridges leading to the Wannabe Mountains to the northeast of the Inn.

Today we shall take a walk in the woods. 

We have journeyed only a short distance and already The verdant magnificence assures us that we have entered another world.  A sense of reverence and stillness overcomes our presence as we are surrounded by cylinder-straight trees rising 90 or more feet to form a thick green canopy.  The is no sunlight, no breeze - nothing from the outside world to distract us.  Perhaps this sense of the sacrosanct inspired our European forefathers to erect their tall cathedral monuments to God.

Yes, we are standing in a cathedral built by the hand of God himself.  But where is the altar?  With no altar, we cannot complete our communion with God - we cannot offer ourselves and our gifts in exchange for a life of meaning and satisfaction.  While the forest engenders a sense of awe and humility, the only thing we see are the trees - tree upon tree with no sequence or significance. 

Too often, my mind is like Wannabe forest.  I am surrounded with ideas and possibilities - so many that I don't know what to do and where I wannabe.  I am overloaded in my thinking.  I cannot choose.  I want to harvest all of the ideas I have but where do I even begin?  Trying to grab too much, I end up with nothing but confusion and turmoil.  A mind, like a forest, is a terrible thing to waste. 

Worse yet, it all begins to look the same.  Losing our sense of direction and time, we are lost with  no idea of where we wannabe.  Swiftly, our awe turns to dread and frustration.  Now we understand the adage, "you cannot see the forest for the trees!"  If we are to find fulfillment and meaning, we must locate an altar.

All of this is metaphor, of course.  But the mind, as well as the body, is a sacred place much like the cathedral effect of a virgin hardwood forest.  But without a focus for worship a cathedral is merely a building.  Worship is what the human spirit is created for.  It satisfies our spirits and connects our souls with the rest of humanity.  The metaphor of worship I use here transcends all human religious endeavors and touches on the religious nature of human life. 

The altar is the point and place of becoming who we really are.  True worship is offering our personhood for the good of life in the pattern of our Creator.  In such a state of being and action, we initiate the meaning and fulfillment we seek.  Therefore we must find the altar.