Saturday, August 14

Shout joyfully to the Lord, all the earth.
—Psalm 100:1

(Revised English Version)

Each summer I get the chance to take in one of my favorite sights—the marsh. A cottage along a river on the coast of South Carolina provides the setting for herons, ospreys, blue crabs, song birds, whippoorwills, and other creatures. They all serenade me in a symphony under God's direction.    

I'm not really sure why I find this corner of God's creation so wonderfully renewing. Perhaps it's the intense sound, smells, or colors. But if I guessed, I think it would have more to do with the music of it all. 

It's a syncopated, harmonious dissonance: tides crashing into one another, island heat clashing with ocean breezes, free-roaming deer running next to alligators. A delicate balance unfolds right before my eyes, and since I don't live amidst it all the time, I think I see its meaning more clearly when I visit.    

This place is a reminder that the whole world is living in the same delicate balance; it's just not as evident in my ordinary, everyday life. Death, destruction, despair are always coupled with life, building, and joy; it's just that way. Our job is to embrace life with all its marshes, looking at it head on, without rose-colored glasses.

If we can begin to see the beautiful rhythm in life's dissonance, we begin to hear the melody of God's creation. It's in that song that we see the cross, not as a symbol of pain and suffering alone, but as a part of God's harmony. And when we see that fact, the cross and empty tomb become one song, one life, one love.    

Call to me in my surroundings. Open my eyes to your presence through nature with all her hopes and dreams and let the love of your cross and empty tomb come to me, that I might find purpose and meaning in my life. Amen.

These Signposts originally appeared on explorefaith in 2006.