The LORD Is Peace

Listen to me read this post:

Lake Tawakoni from the southern shore

A path through tall trees in Lake Tawakoni State Park

Treetops and sky, Lake Tawakoni State Park

Another view of Lake Tawakoni, from the southwestern shore on a clear day

The susurration of trees and lapping of waves

Whisper in antiphon:

YAHWEH Shalom,

YAHWEH Shalom,

The Lord is peace,

The Lord strengthens His people with peace.

The sunflowers lean forward,

In eager expectation awaiting in hope 

The Great Day of the rising

Of the Sun of Righteousness

With healing in His wings.

(Come soon, Lord Jesus.)

Osprey perched in bare tree branches

The osprey's plaintive cry

Laments the groaning bondage of creation now.

The buzzards dance attendance on the last enemy,

Mortally wounded, defanged,

Yet still destroying in death's death throes.

Black and white warbler foraging for insects

Painted bunting in tree branch

Wordlessly, buntings and warblers, cardinals and wrens

Intone their unabashed, unceasing melody of hope

In the not yet:

Prayers are heard,

Promises true,

Prince of Peace coming;

The kingdom of this world

Will become the kingdom of our Lord,

And He shall reign forever.

Weeping will pass.

Joy will come.

The rattling cicadas beat time with their wings,

Counting down the days till deliverance

From corruption to decay.

Giant swallowtail butterfly, ventral wings

Giant swallowtail, dorsal wing

The fluttering swallowtail sips nectar,

So delicately her blooming perch barely moves.

In her partaking of the cup the Lord has filled,

She moves on, scattering with fecund prodigality

Grace for future blooms.

Trees in deep shade with Lake Tawakoni in background

A spider perches upside down in its web, which looks iridescent in the morning light

A fawn looks straight at the camera from the shelter of green trees

The trees of the field lift holy hands to heaven,

Singing for joy before the Lord,

Before He comes

Before He comes

To judge the earth in righteousness.

The nations rage;

The peoples plot and scheme,

But the susurration of trees and lapping of waves,

Yet sing, "The LORD is peace."

The Year of Joy {Looking Back}

 

In this my year of joy, I have relearned that the Lord Himself is the only sure and certain joy; that joy must be fought for by seeking His face in the Scriptures and prayer, in Christian friendships and in Creation. He has kindly sent me tokens of joy and providence in some of the hardest moments of 2022, and there were many. (Books, birds, and butterflies provided some of them, as you may expect.)

Below are some of the best quotes I’ve collected on joy or which felt adjacent to it. (It has been my habit for some years to watch for and gather up occurrences of my year’s focal word in my reading.) As you will see, Christian joy is often discovered in the midst of sorrow and through sorrow (not in opposition to it).

The Year of Joy: 2022

 With some trepidation, I introduce my word of the year:

Joy

Matthew Henry wrote, "A child of God knows no true or solid joy but the joy of God's salvation, joy in God his Saviour and in the hope of eternal life."

Hence the trepidation, as experience has taught me that finding my deepest joy in God's salvation may require some pruning away of lesser earthly joys. (And honestly, this Much-Afraid is weary beneath the pruning shears. Maybe you are too?) The bluebirds who graciously allowed me to take their photos Monday gave me joy; I pray they bring a smile to your face too.

Whether you too are weary and needing fresh joy, or in a season of delightful new beginnings, or perhaps joy seems too far off even to hope for--

May you find joy and strength in the Lord;

May you find your mourning turned to joy, and soon;

May you find joy in the warm, secure refuge of His covering wing;

May you find courage to rejoice in the hope of certain joy ahead according to God's promise, even if you can't see it yet;

May you find joy in the beauty even of this fallen and broken world God created and sustains;

May you find joy in the amazing grace of the salvation won by the death and resurrection of Christ;

May you find joy in the intercession of Son and Spirit, who pray for you and interpret your groanings into the prayers they should be;

May you find joy in the fellowship of the Triune God and of His people;

May you find joy in knowing and being known by Him;

May you find joy in testimonies of lost sinners finding salvation;

May you find joy in sharing the good news of Christ with those who have not heard;

May you find joy in giving to the Lord's work;

May you find joy in the hope of heaven and the expectation of a better country, an eternal rest.

May you find joy, as the Lord will make you joyful,

In Jesus' name,

Amen.

For the Birds {Just Photos}

"Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing?

26 Look at the birds of the air: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not of more value than they?

27 And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life?”

- Matthew 6:25-28

Cedar Waxwing

Red-bellied Woodpecker

Carolina Wren

Dark-eyed Junco

Orange-crowned Warbler

House Finch

White-winged Dove

Mississippi Warbler

Downy Woodpecker

White-winged Dove

Eastern Screech Owl

Tufted Titmouse

Mississippi Kite

Blue Jay

European Starling

Mallards

House Sparrows

An Earful of Waxwings {and a Poem}

Winter is, in my opinion, the best time for birdwatching in our area. We are either winter homes or on the migratory path of quite a few species we don't see the rest of the year, and we are far enough south that the usual suspects, the cardinals and mockingbirds and chickadees and house finches and sparrows, don't feel the need to escape for warmer climes.

This year, in addition to the charm of goldfinches, we have enjoyed watching an abundance of cedar waxwings. They seem to relish the berries of the native Yaupon holly, and we have holly shrubs along one side of the house and a medium-sized tree in the front. It made me laugh to discover that the collective noun for a group of waxwings is either an earful or a museum (Madame Tussaud's, perhaps?).

They look so elegant and a bit mysterious with their black burglars' masks and tiny flash of red at the tips of the wings, but they are spooked by the slightest thing and not brave enough to travel alone. We see a dozen waxwings or a hundred (truly), but not just one.

In the poem below the photos, I play around with that idea a bit. Enjoy!

A hundred banditti alight,
Their stolen shards of shattered sunset
Glowing like candles blazing in bare limbs.

Their theft exacts a high price:
A shadow approaches, and they flee,
Fugitives from their own guilty consciences.

Charming

Words fascinate me in general, but the collective nouns for birds have a particular appeal.

A scold of jays? Yes.
A raft of ducks? Apropos.
A host of sparrows? If our feeders are typical, absolutely.
A drumming of woodpeckers? No joke.
A charm of finches? Indeed.

House finches live year all year, but we only see goldfinches in the winter. They are here en masse right now, and I am loving every minute of it. This morning I counted 10 coming for breakfast at the same time. (They are quite petite, much smaller than house finches or sparrows, but larger than the hummingbirds we see here.)  May the following peeks into our backyard brighten your day.