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Immediately upon stepping out the front door, I thought about grabbing a jacket to put over my short-sleeved shirt. There was a chill in the air that I had not felt in some time, and frankly, was beginning to wonder if I would feel again. Maybe, just maybe, we would have autumn this year.
Before I could decide whether or not to put on a jacket, I heard a honking sound. This was not a mechanical sound, but one from nature. Sure enough, as I looked to the sky, there were geese in migratory flight. As I watched them fly over, I grew a little concerned. There were two flocks of geese. One flock seemed to be heading toward Clinton while the other one was moving more in the direction of Powell.
I am thinking: Wait a minute! It is October. Shouldn’t they be flying south? As I stood in my front yard trying to figure out why these geese were going in what seemed to be the wrong direction, I already knew that I needed to look at a map to confirm my suspicions that they were indeed flying in the wrong direction.
In the meantime, I was listing the possibilities. Maybe the goose in the lead was a male goose who did not want to stop and ask for directions, and was not going to admit that he did not know where he was going. Maybe the whole global warming thing has so warped the seasons that it is already spring and time for the geese to fly north again; and I just did not realize it yet.
When I finally got to a map, my suspicions were confirmed. Those birds were flying north and northeast. Why? I do not know. Most likely they were headed for a nearby body of water. I am sure they had a good reason for going in the direction they were going because migration is the thing that geese do best. They have a flight range of two to three thousand miles. They fly with amazing endurance and determination. Somehow, every year, they know when to fly south and when to return. They know when they are leaving and where they are headed. They keep flying until they get there.
Young geese learn their migration route from older birds. They are not just born knowing where to go when it comes time to migrate. They get their sense of direction in groups that follow the more experienced birds.
As human beings seeking direction and purpose in our lives, we must be learners as well. We learn from the community of faith with which we are journeying through life, as well as from those who have gone before us. Ultimately, we learn from the Holy Spirit of God, who is resident in our lives comforting, convicting, and ever calling us. As we seek the presence of God and immerse our lives in that presence, our awareness of God as ever present and always with us becomes something of a continuous recollection.
The prayer of the Psalmist, “O God, come to my aid; O Lord, make haste to help me,” serves both as a prayer request and a description of our spiritual state. We are always wanting and needing more of God; and all the time, God is wanting and needing to be more with us. So then, the Psalm can be our prayer as well as the rhythm of our heart: “O God, come to my aid; O, Lord, make haste to help me.”
As we breathe these words of the Psalmist in and out of our hearts, our lives find ourselves much like another migrating species — the Monarch Butterflies — able to migrate without previous experience to a place they have never before been.
As amazing as the migratory patterns of some of nature’s creatures are, is it not even more amazing that God can so put Godself into us that not only do our lives and the way we live them change, but their
ultimate
destinations
change as
well.
Joy and peace,
Ed
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