Yesterday, I was watching Jane and Anabelle as they were enjoying their snacks under an old redwood tree. There was a precocious five-year old young girl, with her sexy-genarian Lola, picnicking under a two-hundred year old tree. Every now and then, I would wave at them from where I was seated in the public library and Jane would either wave back or make funny faces at me, while Lola looked at her lovingly. I was struck by the ethereal beauty of the scene.
Jane can make my heart flutter like a gentle wind caressing my soul with extreme contentment. Just as Anabelle has always made my heart beat with love, longing and gladness untold. Just as the towering redwood tree they were picnicking under would make my spirit soar upward with dreams and visions of beauty and eternity. Anabelle and I are in the winter of our lives. Jane’s is just beginning. The tree has been there long before we were and will be there long after we are gone. It all seemed a random meeting and juxtaposition of people and events: a young girl and her Lola under the giant redwood tree. And yet, the scene all made sense. Another one of those days where God speaks to me in very subtle and silent ways in the ordinary events of my life.
A baby is born, grows up to be a pretty young girl and I pray she will become a fine young lady – still within my lifetime. A fine young lady meets a dreamer of a young man, marries him and they raise a wonderful family – this has been my lifetime. A tree grows in the park and in its mute silence provides shelter to picnic in to countless young girl having an ethereal moment with her mother or her Lola – my lifetime merely a moment in its existence. Yes, the world makes sense even when we do not see nor hear the signs.
“Lord, make me see and hear what you are telling me through the ordinary events of my day so that I may bear fruit thirty and sixty and a hundredfold.”
“A sower went out to sow.
And as he sowed, some seed fell on the path,
and the birds came and ate it up.
Other seed fell on rocky ground where it had little soil.
It sprang up at once because the soil was not deep.
And when the sun rose, it was scorched and it withered for lack of roots.
Some seed fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked it
and it produced no grain.
And some seed fell on rich soil and produced fruit.
It came up and grew and yielded thirty, sixty, and a hundredfold.
Whoever has ears to hear ought to hear.”
Mark 4:1-9