Springtime in Vermont

Courage, Dear Heart

Lucy stands in the crows nest, high above the deck of The Dawn Treader, with an arrow ready on her bowstring. Ahead of her lies the dark tunnel, a lump of blackness and despair that seemingly cannot be penetrated with any physical light. She shivers. Her heart quakes as she looks ahead at this test, this foolhardy adventure, and in her heart she prays for the one light that she knows can go with her anywhere. As the ship nears the entrance of the dark tunnel, she looks back one last time at the Sun and sees something in the shape of a darkened cross against the brightness. She blinks as she sees it getting larger and then realizes that it is a bird of the sea, an albatross. And suddenly it is above her, circling around the mast, closer and closer until it whirrs near her head, surrounding her with a glorious perfume and the whispered words: Courage, dear heart.

* * *

I wake up overwhelmed. I am exhausted. It is still dark out, and I am already worrying about the outcome of my day. It is not merely that this single day has me stumped, but that the weeks to come are looking blacker as the February zooms closer to midterms. And this morning--I have a paper to finish, a bed to be made, and some semblance of physical presentation necessary before I arrive at work in so short amount of time. I take the time to open my Bible, to be assured that my strength is indeed inadequate and that God's strength alone is perfected in my weakness. All too soon I set about my other tasks and finally find myself running to work to make it on time, praying. Something moves on the ground in front of me at the base of one of the large campus trees, leaving the ground and flapping up to the lowest branch. I stop running, noting already by its size that it is a hawk, musing that it is likely the red-tail I have often seen down by the dairy. I am within twenty feet of it now, and it still sits there, looking around, seemingly unconcerned. I keep walking, and it flies to a tree on the other side of the side-walk, its brown and white speckled chest clearly visible. I walk nearly underneath it, stop, and gaze up at its eyes, at its folded wings, at its curving beak. I stand there and know that I am already a minute or two late for work, that my paper is not as I would like it, and that there are yet many hours until Sabbath. But that is okay. Courage, dear heart.

He Counts the Stars- Psalm 147:4

We very rarely begin a task without having a specific, self-interested reason for doing so. We attend school perhaps because we want to learn, but of course due to the reality that without an education, we do not have as much opportunity for making a living. In turn, we work not necessarily because we enjoy it, but because we wish to have the perks that come along with money. We are kind to our neighbors, hopefully in wishing to live as Christ, but as a practical means of ensuring our own support when we ourselves are in difficult straits.

He counts the number of the stars.

I daresay He does not need to know their number. He has told us that He can count the stars, and yet has never published in human tongue the exact number, like He might of if He were human--He has not printed it in the latest scientific journal, signed GOD. In that sense He has not boasted. And it is not as if stars are human beings, in need of at least the occassional meal or sip of water, or birds, desirous of twig-ball nests and leafy branches above them, or living creatures in need of His mighty hand for survival. To be sure, however, stars owe to Him their placement and their suspension in the atmosphere. But stars are stars: things we humans know so little about in the grand scheme of things; bright drops in the sky little children look at and imagine to be nail holes of light into the heavens, or rolling orbs of fire, or fireflies, forever placed and forever "on." What end is to be achieved by counting them?

He counts the number of the stars.

Could it be else, but wonder? Could it be else but uncontainable joy? John Ortberg writes in The Life You've Always Wanted that he imagines God saying to the sun each day, with the innocence and joy of a child, "Do it again," shine another day (62). And why not to the stars as well? To God, they have never grown dusty--each morning, each evening, like the first day, He kindles fire in them again, calling them by their individual name, glowing them.

He counts the number of the stars; He gives names to all of them

God told Abraham several times in Genesis that his descendants would someday be as the stars. In Genesis 15, we read that "He [God] took him outside and said, 'Now look toward the heavens, and count the stars, if you are able to count them.' " God concludes His show-and-tell by reminding Abraham once again that his family will once be that numerous.

Are not we, by faith, children of Abraham? Are not we the uncountable stars burning little dots of light into the black around us?

He counts the number of the stars; He gives names to all of them

Like the stars, we each have our own name, given by an excited and fond-eyed Name-giver in a continual burst of creativity. We ourselves are evidences of God's laughter, delight, and star-counting extravagance; uniquely called and predestined and justified and glorified.

In The Problem of Pain, C.S. Lewis writes:
“What can be more a man’s own than this new name which even in eternity remains a secret between God and him? And what shall we take this secrecy to mean? Surely, that each of the redeemed shall forever know and praise some one aspect of the divine beauty better than any other creature can. Why else were individuals created, but that God, loving all infinitely, should love each differently?" (150).

And so He counts the number of the stars; He gives names to all of them.

He has given us names that each take part in His wonder. He has given us pieces of Himself, bits of His starglow. And yet though we are too many to count, His light is not reduced by a fraction--It fills the heavens so as to take away need of the sun--it is only amplified by the gift.

Seeing Snow

Snow...

Has been crawling up trees like overly-large albino catepillars, or slugs leaving trails of white mucas behind them, or sub-sandwiches pickable and munchable

Snow has been clining to twigs like particles of pussy willows

Snow has been hugging limbs like giant rodents, balancing with the aide of long tails, attempting to soak up the sun

Snow has been capping scarlet berries with crystal drops of white

Snow has been pillowing woodland arches with wild wraps

Snow has been carved by the wind, flaked and shattered into pointed shards

Snow has been following winter-browned flowers with funnels of shadow

Snow has been skating around golden grass stems, leaving a history of subtle waves

And snow has been bluing and dancing and growing in reddened peach orchards

And growing in the sun

Ode to a Missionary's Crocs

With hiking poles they clapped their soles
while strapped to backpacking sacks, and sang
their marching song with softer note to cookstove
cooked soup and tired heels and toes
rose-colored with climbing, walking, comforting
them cozy-like. Somedays, crocing, they slid
on mud amid puddles, squeaking wet and
clean with cold--but cradling feet in such a way,
contagiously congenial.

When winter whipped a fire-red
sheen across cheeks and stiffened beards
with beads of frosted snow, they worked with wool
and warmly wiped the windy blusters off and swept
them skating out through open windows, snuggling
about the chilly feet a lullaby of soft sole and
curving length sprinkled with holes.
Travelers, they lately tromped amongst trials
and children, sharing smiles despite a thinning
life of labor, flying with fever-relievers and bearing
help to souls by bearing him.


Faithful, they, even when holing, forbearing
several rocks only to bruise and black his arch, doing what
a pair of recycled tire bits, rough, dark, blistering, though trusty,
will never do.