Have you seen the movie, The Bucket List? Blue collar mechanic Carter Chambers and billionaire hospital magnate Edward Cole meet for the first time in the hospital after both have been diagnosed with cancer. They become friends as they undergo their respective treatments. Carter is a gifted amateur historian and family man who had wanted to become a history professor, but in his youth had been "broke, black, and with a baby on the way" and thus never rose above his job at the McCreath body shop. Edward is a four-times-divorced corporate tycoon and eccentric loner.

Both are diagnosed with a year or less to live. Carter begins writing a "bucket list," or things to do before he "kicks the bucket." After hearing he has less than a year to live, Carter wads it up and tosses it on the floor. Edward finds and reads it. Edward pushes Carter (by suggesting he add things like seeing the world, skydiving ("fun things," etc.), and promises to finance the trip. Despite the protests of his wife, Carter eagerly agrees.

The pair then begin an around-the-world vacation, embarking on race car driving, skydiving, climbing the Pyramids and going on a lion safari in Africa. Along the way, they discuss faith and family, and movie goers watch as they slowly open up about their deepest feelings and an intimate friendship grows.

Recently Chuck preached a sermon The Bucket List in which he challenged us to look at God's bucket list for His people and to experience His dreams for each of us in 2009. I'm sure many hearing the message were as stunned as I to consider how many dreams God has for each of us, dreams designed to give us an eternal purpose, dreams that we never experience. At the end of every year, I spend a lot of time processing the past and considering my priorities for the next year. Chuck's sermon narrowed my focus for 2009 and I'm actively creating my own list of spiritual experiences and activities that I hope to accomplish before I "kick the bucket!"

What have I always wanted to do but have not made a priority because it would take too much time, too much energy, or I might fail? At the top of my Spiritual Bucket List is the desire to be a praying woman. A few years ago my friend, Carol Marker, and I traveled to Japan to speak at a women's retreat. The organizer of the retreat was an elderly woman whose husband was fighting serious cancer. This woman took us to the top of a mountain that overlooked the city. Her passion for the thousands of people represented by the homes in the valley and the Naval Base moved us to tears. On the way up and down the mountain she pointed out altars to other gods where travelers would stop along the way and pray. She told us she used those altars for her own prayer time to the One True God. We were on holy ground. But this precious woman was not just other worldly in her prayer connection to God. As she started driving us back to the retreat center, we soon realized she had no idea where we were. Remember, we're in Japan. We don't speak Japanese and apparently she spoke very little herself! After our hostess admitted we were lost, she continued the conversation with, "And Jesus, we need you to show us how to get home...." She talked to Him as though (imagine this!) He was right in the seat next to her! And we soon found our way home.

She didn't giggle nervously as though praying in the middle of a conversation something odd. She just inserted the comment in the middle of her remarks to us and continued on as though talking to Jesus was normal. Which we soon realized, for her, it was. Her private prayer closet intimacy showed through in her daily conversations. Talking out loud to Jesus, by name, in the middle of a conversation with other human beings, was just as natural to her as breathing. I want my conversations with Jesus to be like hers when I grow up!

The first time Chuck and I traveled outside America was to Abidjan, South Africa. Chuck was there to teach African seminary students and I was there to help organize the women's ministry and speak at an African women's retreat. One of our first stops was a mid-day prayer meeting where four or five African men passionately prayed several times a day, every day, at the same time the horns blew to call Moslems to pray. They prayed out loud, loudly, sometimes wailing to God to bring revival to Africa. We didn't understand the language but we understood their hearts. They rocked back and forth, sometimes moaning under their burden for the peace of their local church and the salvation of family members and their country. I want to have that kind of praying heart for the unsaved and for my church.

These two experiences wakened in me a longing for more in my own prayer life. But life distracted me and the moment passed.

In the years following our son's death, I experienced that kind of personal intimacy with Jesus. I have the journals to remind me. But life distracted me and my heart forgot just how real and deep God's presence is when we open our souls to His dreams for us.

At the top of my spiritual bucket list is the goal of going deeper into the presence of God through the pathway of prayer. This is a selfish goal because I know accomplishing it will lead me into joy unspeakable. To help me focus on the privilege of intimacy with Christ, I am identifying a scripture passage to pray for each person in my family as well as scripture for our church. And here's the second item on my bucket list, memorizing scripture. I hope to memorize one passage a month so that I can pray scripture wherever I am and know that I am praying God's dreams for these people and for our church. Right now I am praying Psalm 122 for our church and our congregation. I am praying Psalm 121 for our new granddaughter, Siddhi, while we wait for her to come home from India and for our grandson, Cori, as he serves in the Navy.

If the bucket list intrigues you as it does me, I invite you to subscribe to my blog by entering your email address in the 'Subscribe' field in the left menu and join the conversation over the next few weeks as I share some of my thoughts on God's "bucket list" in 2009.

What's on your bucket list?

In His grip,
Sharon