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I Thank The Lord For His Merciful And Inimitable Timing
I thank the Lord for His merciful and inimitable timing, and that He---in His inifinite Love and kindness---has deigned to personalize my journey toward him, especially at this critical time which I believe to be the last stage or phase of it. I do not know how long this will last. Therefore, these thoughts that have been disclosed to me need to be recorded now.
I have spent forty-eight years meditating upon, contemplating, examining, and eagerly and delightedly reminiscing about the year 1976, the year I attained my eighteenth birthday; especially that most significant parts of the year, July 9th through September 8th, and November 23rd through January 2nd, 1977. There were so many elements around me, some seemed like complete disclosures, others like loose ends---so many things to learn swirling around me. Primary among them was my liberation---helped and aided by my First Beloved---to escape the mundane identity that had haunted me for seventeen years, and to become Starwatcher (c.b. handle) on Saturday, July 10th, 1976; a handle that would evolve to its final form, my screen name Starward---the name that will be included on my tombstone (if my final requests are heeded).
I did not know how some of these would eventually come together---exposure to Baptist faith, and yet always an inclination to worship primarily Liturgical. The ambition to Poetry was constantly present, sometimes submerged, but never absent. The sense of both liberation from the past, vivacity in the present, and stability in the future was represented by Starwatcher.
From my present perspective I can see a more clear array. I have always loved Easter, especially Easter eggs. And I think God has hid, or scattered, Easter Eggs in the summer of 1976, for me to find now, as I draw closer to the end of my journey toward His Kingdom; this is part of the preparation for that Kingdom. And in collecting those eggs I find certain of what seemed loose ends to become woven into a tapestry (I am badly mixing metaphors here). I became a Baptist Christian in 1994, and though I rejoice in that and will never abjure it, I prefer to worship according to the Liturgy and Theology of the Orthodox Church. And, when I was chrismated into the Orthodox Faity on the day before Pascha in 2014, the Church accepted and endorsed the Baptism given me in the Baptist Church on January 16th, 1994. I still communicate on an electronic device, often with people I have never met in person. And Starwatcher eventually blossomed into Starward, and will be so on my tombstone.
Thank you Lord for allowing me time to bear witness to this.
Starward
