Awesome Glory and Gratitude and Terrible Hardship

Awesome Glory and Gratitude and Terrible Hardship

In my sojourns across ‘The County’ increasingly I am in awe of God’s creation.  We are so lucky to live here.  It is such an overwhelming feeling that one can’t help but feel guilt seeping in for those that do not have this.

I have seen silver glass often in the early mornings on my way to my walks on my trail south of town.  I’ve seen it on the Little Lake, nestled inside our county and on the Big Sea that surrounds our county.  t reminds me or resembles Frodo of the Lord of the Rings last journey as He sailed into the West on a sea of silver glass to be on the Other Side, Heaven.  His race completed.

On the way back often a slight breeze will pick up and turn both bodies of water in to a lake and sea of diamonds glittering so prolifically and brilliantly sometimes you have to avert your eyes.

And I thank The Lord of Creation over and over and over and over.

I get to the chance to walk a farm who is cared for people with not only deep roots in the earth but even more so deep roots in Faith.  I get to oogle and goggle at all kinds of flora, fauna, vegetables, pumpkins, squash, corn and a proliferation of what nature, through Her Creator, abounds in pines, swamps, fields that appear to be touched with gold, plants I can no longer remember the names of but recognize.  The folk who tend this gift do so carefully and with great care.  It shows as they delicately leave their footprint on what God gave them to manage.

And though as I sit and watch the heavens at night and am disturbed that half the stars have been obscured and the milky way grown faint due to the fires ranging west of us, still I recognize constellations.  And in the wee hours of the morning I can still see the Pleiades, the Seven Sisters, my Dad’s favorite constellation, directly overhead.

And I talk with Him and Our Lord for lengths of time I cannot recall, other than they are peaceful, and a chance to find great Holiness in the sky.

Watching the heavens as they change through the seasons has always been one of my favorite things to do.  Now it is in the top three.  The other two being my walks (once a week with a dear friend) and Church and all that represents.  The place where Our Lord resides in real form.  The place where I always feel welcome.  The place where I feel truly home.  The place where I believe my true family of God lives.

I am unbelievably blessed.  As we all are who live here.  I am overwhelmed.  I can’t express my gratitude enough, and certainly not in earthspeak.  

And then I think of Afghanistan, Louisiana, our Western States, even Minnesota’s Arrowhead. And so many other places on our planet that suffer because of what those created in His Image and Likeness do to one another and to our planet.  Strife, agony, burning, often total helplessness.

And I weep.  And I pray relentlessly.

In fact throughout writing this article I found tears streaming down my face both in great gratitude and great sorrow.

And so I pray some more asking in the name of our Master that the evil one leave our world and also ….

Here I am Lord, I come to do your will.

Clement