Reflections

(While Jackie is on renewal leave we will have guest posters provide our weekly reflection.  If you would like an opportunity to blog to the Northern Maine District, contact the district office for available dates)

Psalm 42

¹ As the deer pants for streams of water,
    so my soul pants for you, my God.
² My soul thirsts for God, for the living God.
    When can I go and meet with God?........
 

⁸ By day the Lord directs his love,
    at night his song is with me—
    a prayer to the God of my life………

¹¹ Why, my soul, are you downcast?
    Why so disturbed within me?
Put your hope in God,
    for I will yet praise him,
    my Savior and my God.

16 July 2019

            In the places I live, travel and work, does and fawns are familiar sites.  Just the other day, I glimpsed a doe striding through a field with a fawn bounding, in leaps to match her steps, behind her.   Perhaps, more this year than any other, I have been aware of the small miracles around me in this world.  The handiwork of God is everywhere!  From the nesting songbirds to doe and fawn to the black bear investigating my sister-in-law’s feeder just off the corner of her porch, God’s hand and presence is in this world.

            Have you noticed the glorious wonder of the work of God in our world which often  makes us cry out as did the writer of  Psalm 42 did with the words, ‘I say to God my Rock, “Why have your forgotten me?” (verse 9a)    How many times have these words been uttered from the depths of our souls as we witness neighbor against neighbor?  How many times have we felt these words deep in the center of our bodies when we suffer from the divisions that run deep and wide?

            And yet, there it is!  Hope, mercy, gentleness, GRACE that reminds us that we truly are not without hope in this world. 

            Every fall when hunting season comes along, I worry for the doe in the pictures above because she has birthed many a fawn…sometimes multiples! And yet, again this spring, there she was, heavy with fawn, seeking out a safe resting place on a neighbor’s lawn before birthing the little one.  The next morning, she was nursing the fawn near another neighbor’s pond! A while later, the Fawn walking behind momma on our road! 

            Maybe some of you will say. “Oh such naïveté, Michele! Have you read the paper, heard the news...!! Where is your strong voice calling for justice?” Or some other such thing.  Ah...it is still here! My heart, as do the hearts of all seeking mercy, justice and love, cries out and my nature is to speak against injustice wherever it may be found.  Every day.

         And yet, and yet, my heart, my soul, and perhaps yours, too, stumbles, hungers and fades without stopping to seek out God in the way of the deer that pants for water.  Or in this illustration, as the doe sought out rest and safety and peace.

        Pause, if you will, to renew your hope, peace, strength in beauty of God’s handiwork.

* today's guest reflection was provided by Rev. Michele St Cyr.  Pictures are her own.

If you would like to share a reflection with the Northern Maine District there are still spaces available in August.  You do not need to be clergy to participate.  Contact the district office for available dates.