Pastoral Ponderings- Wayside Sacrament
“Don’t you bring that inside!” Ken insists, as Darling Wife Fern carries in yet another treasure of the beauty of God’s creation to their house filled with other similar treasures, with pictures (and puzzles I was also invited to work on) of the National Parks, and family handcrafted nature crafts. “I’m just taking it out back…” Fern replies, as she carries the protested feathers in the door, likely to the back porch “catio” where many such tangible “God Sightings” can be found.
A great beginning to a week of sabbath rest and immersion into the beauty of God’s creation as our souls are being refreshed by both great teaching and signs of divine Presence everywhere. Ken and Fern have a piece of poster art hanging on their wall that in the foreground depicts a bird, looking like one of those Audubon Society prints, on what looks like a copy of a post card, signed in flowing print, “R. W. Emerson.” The cursive script in the faded background reads, “Beauty is God’s handwriting, a wayside sacrament. He prayeth well who loveth both man and bird.”
The feathers Fern carried is from such a beloved bird—nothing “special”—from a common mourning dove—are now displayed on the porch as a “wayside sacrament” of a simple visit with neighbors where God’s presence was relished for a moment. Sitting talking with Ken’s mom, Sharon, whom I know has seen that print hanging there hundreds of times, I asked if she’d noticed some detail of the image, and she replied, “I’ve seen it so many times, I must have just not noticed.” How true it is that we have so many times seen such wayside sacraments, the handwritten love letters from God all around us every day, that we so often don’t even notice?
Lord, give us eyes to see Your handwritten notes of beauty around us, that we, too, may relish each day these wayside sacraments of Your presence, so common, so ubiquitous, yet so easily missed. Pastor Jim