Where do you go to get inspiration? For so many of us the concerns and demands of job and family squeeze our routines into fairly un-inspired existences. Our horizons shrink and it becomes increasingly difficult to see beyond the many everyday necessities of our lives. What we desperately need in the rhythm and routine of our lives are places of inspiration. That is, spaces and times where we seek a greater vision, where the many possibilities of life counter and hold in tension life’s many necessities. To be inspired is to gain perspective and hope for our past, present, and future. We become stimulated toward a better way of thinking, seeing, acting and responding to the world around us, and our role in it. For me inspiration has come from a variety of sources over the years: visits to a prayer chapel on the other side of campus, a trip to another part of world, a new Eugene Peterson book, a Counting Crows concert, a long walk around the neighborhood, a prayerful reading of Luke’s gospel, a lingering cup of coffee with a wise person, and the list could keep on going. Some of these experiences are one-time occurrences, but others are practices and habits to which we regularly return. When everything around us starts to have a smothering and suffocating effect we need places where we can breathe in deeply. We need places of inspiration. Where do you go to get inspiration?
