Visiting with my new pastor and his wife, on a warm July night, we talk about everything. Friendship and love, writing, preaching, how to make to-die-for zucchini snacks... and
how God speaks.
Somewhere between talking about our kids and chatting about the challenges of marriage my pastor says,
God speaks primarily through His word. And just as I begin to assent, there's a little catch in my throat.
I... I'm not sure I agree... my voice drifts off. I've been thinking about this very thing as I struggle to write my next chapter in
God in the Yard.
I am thinking about how God spoke to me about the importance of family, through seeing the lost and homeless on the streets of Washington, D.C. I'm thinking about a filmed art piece called
The Way Things Go, in which sometimes imperceptible changes caused a chain reaction of events, that caused another chain reaction, and so on... and God spoke through that too, about life and living it consciously and well.
Maybe more than anything this night, I am thinking of Walt Whitman, an unlikely bard of the inexpressible love of Jesus. There is
this poem, see, and it manages to speak of
grace. The inexplicable ability of Jesus to see us as we are and not turn away, to gently touch all parts of us, both glorious and inglorious. Reading this poem makes me weep, and I find myself practically laid out flat with the wonder of what it means to be loved, really loved, graced by Jesus.
I pick up a paper-thin zucchini, dripping with vinegar, sprinkled with salt and fresh ground pepper. I turn it over on my tongue and let myself revel in its texture. I smile at my pastor and his wife, and bite into the words of God to my heart.
Love, grace... in a fresh, ivory, green-bleeding slice of zucchini...
Red Design photo, by Sara. Used with permission.
STONE CROSSINGS:
Andrea's gentle
Book ReviewTed's book club post
Goldsworthy's Wall: SacrificeRELATED:
LL's
Word, at
Love Notes to YahwehLabels: grace, presence