Looking Up (9/16/2023)

This past week has been pretty busy for the gal in my shoes. Sometimes, you’ll have that. My lists were long, my time in reflection and just being were short. And Thursday evening, as I drove myself and my friend home after a great meeting of the parish women, I could feel it. I needed just a few moments of looking up in serene silence. So, after I dropped my friend, I doubled back to the frisbee golf range, pulled into the parking lot, turned off the car, got out, and looked up. It was a crystal-clear night, and the stars were so vivid. And I whispered to my LORD, “Oh, my!”

And in that instance, I realized that there is so much more to this world than me and my problems and issues. I realized anew with even deeper conviction that there is a LORD, and it is not me. And yet, in that same instance, I felt the LORD of the universe present. How could that be? One so inconsequential in such a huge universe. I don’t understand it. All I know is that that’s who the LORD is.

I thanked the LORD for the wonder. I thanked the LORD for my life. I thanked the LORD for the gift of that moment purposely in His presence. I thanked Him for calling me to it, for embedding in my heart that longing. I thanked the LORD for the love I don’t deserve but cannot do without. And I begged the LORD for the grace needed to take my place within this universe as the one I was created to be. And then I just stood there for a few more moments being.

Every now and then, I have learned, I just need to look up. I need to remove myself from the fray of life and all the busyness, all the distractions. While many have great merit and deserve my attention, if I don’t stop to look up once in a while, I can begin to believe that it’s all about me and what I’m doing. And that would be a huge mistake. Thursday night in that frisbee golf range I remembered my origin, I remembered my destination.

Our journeys in this time can be so very full with worthwhile activities and with precious family, friends, and even strangers who need our help. But if we don’t take the time to re-charge, to re-center, to re-orient ourselves, we can begin to think that it’s all about what we’re doing. And the reality is, it’s all about what the LORD is doing in us, with us, and through us.

Looking up in silence on a star-studded night can remind us of the awesome LORD for whom we labor and to whom we journey. It’s worth the stop.

Until tomorrow, let us all love well.