God in the Woods

Everyone needs a letting go
A stand in the rain
A look the sky in the face
And throw your burdens at the clouds.

Everyone needs to run through the woods
To shed their skin
To breathe in. To breathe out.
To expel the poison in their bones.

My spirit is not found in steepled churches
My heart is not contained by those four walls
My confession is not boxed by wooden screens
Or by mere mortal men.

My heart dwells in the river bed
It lives in the stones
Wrapped, shaped, and smoothed by the rushing stream.
My spirit sits on the tallest of trees
Bathed by the sun, reaching uninhibited into the sky
My confessions are carried by the wind
I speak them, and they vanish to the east onto the west
And the length in between

My Jesus does not live in the temples of man.
My Lord is not contained by their four walls.
My God dwells with me.
My God is in the woods.



[and everywhere.]