The Incredible Sweetness of Being, Part Eleven
Rounding a curve on our skinny canyon road, we come upon the stopped SUV, its left hip jutting into the roadway. Rich pulls up alongside and I roll down my window: “Did you break down? Do you need a push?” I point to the wide spot in the shoulder about 40 feet ahead of us. My brain hurries on toward home. We have guests coming. Will I get dirty? It’ll take all of us to move this big thing.
“No,” the driver says. “We’re watching the eagle.” He points up. Perched on a utility pole before us, a golden eagle presides over our corner of the foothills.
I forget about our guests and my selfish worry that this man’s need might impede us. Rich eases our car onto that wide spot on the shoulder and we watch, agape, as the eagle lifts its wings, soars down to the pavement just a few yards from us, and tears at the corpse of a roadkilled rabbit. A moment later, two mighty flaps of majestic wings carry it from harm’s way as a truck rounds the curve and bears down on it.
“That was something,” I say, as we continue on to home.
“It was,” Rich replies.
At home, I set out chips and double-check our ice supply. I smooth the tablecloth and fuss with the vase of flowers centered upon it, indulging in the folly that I might improve upon a lily. Our guests arrive and we pass a properly slow, properly lovely afternoon. I tell them we saw an eagle, that very day, right in our own neighborhood.
We’d paused for awesome, stopped to glory in His creation, and it didn’t ruin our day.
I’m left with two questions:
How often do I hustle right past His marvels, too absorbed in my own agenda to enjoy His?
If I can so easily ignore His invitation to rest in the beauty of His creation, what else am I avoiding?
“ You alone are the Lord.
You have made the heavens,
The heaven of heavens with all their host,
The earth and all that is on it,
The seas and all that is in them.
You give life to all of them
And the heavenly host bows down before You.”
Nehemiah 9:6 (NASB)
My word for 2012 is “be.” You can find other posts in this series here.
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