From the Rector…
On Valentine’s Day, I got into a fight with a leaf. I had just arrived at the office when I opened the door, and a leaf blew in. I picked it up to drop it back outside, but it blew in again. This happened a couple more times, and I started to laugh at the absurdity of this persistent little leaf. So, I bent down, picked it up, and really noticed it for the first time.
In the very center of the leaf on either side of the central stem that ran the length of its body, two holes had been torn out, leaving the shape of a perfect heart. As I gazed at the leaf, I smiled, realizing that God, in his gentle way and with a bit of humor, was sending me a sign of his presence.
Signs of God are all around us. Usually, we are too busy to notice them, but when we stop and truly gaze at the world and all that is therein, we are more likely to see them. Richard Rohr calls this “gazing”, prayer, and says that it is different from “glancing”—seeing the world without really seeing it—or “glaring”, which is our judgmental/critical approach to one another and the world. In gazing, we release ourselves from distraction and become aware that there is more to the world than our limited understandings and desires. We become aware that God is with us. When I was trying to just get the leaf out the door, I was only glancing. Once I began to gaze at the leaf, I discovered the joy of the sign God was offering me.
I don’t think of signs like crystal balls telling us what the future holds. Instead, I believe signs are God’s reminders of his presence with us. They are those little moments when our hope is nurtured and our faith is encouraged. I have known a few signs from God in my life, none of which told me of things to come, but all of which reminded me that God was right in the midst of my present concerns. There was the perfect cross in the sky over the graveyard when my grandfather was buried; the cloud mass that formed a huge angel filling the sky from one side of the horizon to the other when I was returning from visiting a friend in prison; the pink dump truck that almost killed Steve and me during our IVF treatments; not to mention an assortment of dreams and other mystical occurrences I’ve experienced throughout my life. The signs of God are all around us if we take the time to slow down and gaze at the world.
I’ll admit, the best signs are the ones God insists we notice—like that little leaf last Friday. It was the sweetest Valentine after a sad and grief-filled week. And its delivery reminded me that God does not give up on us. No matter how distracted or self-involved we become, God tries all the harder to remind us of his love for us. So often, it is simply the little things—a perfect heart-shaped tear in the middle of a leaf—that nurture our trust and hope in the wideness of God’s love and mercy.
Light and Life,
Candice+