Hearing the bird whistles I had been deaf to just moments earlier, so noisy my thoughts,

I whistled back.

Breathing in each sound as sunlight moved back morning shadows while

Sitting in stillness, exhaling, emptying what remained of my yesterdays,

Craving a refilling, thirsty, I inhaled the morning air.

Warmth broke through the chill and I was still,

Exhaling.

Then, moment by moment, word by word, into the silence I descended. Or was it that I rose?

Light entering darkness,

With anticipation and expectation I read the Bible, and waited to hear.

How does it happen that the Spirit stirs and speaks?

I listened beneath the shadow of his wing and when I felt it lift, I mounted and was carried into the day.

Just as I was that day.

That’s how I felt that morning in a hospital bed one year ago. I was amazed. I shouldn’t have opened my eyes,

Nor known where I was, but I did. I shouldn’t have survived the fall, but my husband made a few calls.

To praying people, he called, and the praying people called more praying people. The whole church prayed. It was Lent, a year ago. A miracle.

I find myself reminiscing.

Soon it will be holy week, and I can’t help but think it will be a lonely week for many who have lost their homes, are parted from loved ones.

This was the most painful part of the holy story, as he neared the end of his holy mission on earth, facing abandonment, unjust cruelty, separation and death.

Do you wonder what kept him going? Maybe not. Or maybe you say, “He was God, and I am not,” as you face cruelty, separation, abandonment. Death. Maybe you don’t have a holy story to hold on to,

To meditate on.

Then think for a moment of love, and of doing the will of the one you love? He did.

What keeps us going when we’re in the worst of it?

We can’t lose our wonder. We can’t stop seeking beauty. He did not.

He hung there while those he had loved and counted on abandoned him, when it seemed his mission lay in ruins around

Him and at his feet. He left earth, seemingly, a failure.

But he was on the brink of new life!

Resurrection.

How often do we face utter loss, feel alone, when what we thought we were here for lies in ruins at our own feet?

God’s love did not fail Jesus. Jesus’ own love did not fail God, and he did not fail us.

How can we survive such a world as ours without sustaining this ever-lasting, always complete, love of God? I cannot.

Sweet signs, new life.