Reflection and Holy Experience

I never tire of photographing the leaves in my backyard, sunrises, and my kids.  What a gift to know everything in creation is unique....one of a kind!

 Have I mentioned I love fall?  Maybe a couple dozen times?  I’m sorry but it is true.

 This really is the most spectacular season where I give myself permission to get distracted by swirling leaves and blue skies.  I drop my chores and to do lists so I can head outside, my camera in hand.  A couple of years ago I may not have appreciated mushrooms growing in my yard but today, I slow down to acknowledge their unexpected appearance. 

I have noticed that when I am surrounded by goodness, my mind tends to wander away from beauty.  I have been given so much while others suffer and are hurting.

  I was telling my friend yesterday at lunch that I sometimes in the midst of joy, I find myself looking over my shoulder for the other shoe to drop.  Surely happiness cannot last.   I spend a lot of time reflecting on my life to be more purposeful.

I came upon the writing of Ann Voskamp that I have been pondering all day since the talk with my friend.  

"But I have lived pain and my life can tell: I only deepen the wound of the world when I neglect to give thanks for early light dappled through leaves and the heavy perfume of peonies in June and the song of crickets on summer humid nights and the rivers that run and the stars that rise and the rain that falls and all the good things that a good Father gives.



How does it save the world to reject unabashed joy when it is Joy Who saves us? Rejecting joy to stand in solidarity with the suffering doesn’t rescue the suffering. The converse does.
The brave who focus on all things good and all things beauty and all things true, even in the small, who give thanks for it and discover joy even in the here and now, they are the change agents who bring fullest Light to all the world."

   I am still chewing on this.