Glory All Around

Every now and then I look through the pictures on my phone.  Often I get tickled at what I find, frame after frame of random snap-shots from the vantage point of a very small person.  I've begun to understand that when my little one says, "Mommy, me play your phone," it usually means I have a budding photographer in the making. 

What is it that he looks at?  What does the world look like from where he stands?  What does he take notice of?

Sure there are lots (and lots) of pictures of carpet. . . . or concrete.  But then I notice there are some great pictures in there too.  And I begin to realize that he sees the world in a completely different way than I do.

So often I am focused on accomplishing a goal, moving through a process, completing a task, just trying to finish something.  My mind is preoccupied with plans, problems, and possibilities.  And it is so impossible sometimes to just be in the moment.  To take in all that is available to me.  To taste and see in each moment that God really is good.

And when I see my littlest boy's pictures I realize that this is the only way he knows how to live.

I remember a time when I looked at grass.  I mean really looked at it.  Flopping a beach towel on the lawn in front of the chapel at seminary, I laid down on my belly, and from ground level I watched the grass grow.  I still remember the pain of that day.  I had left class feeling the weight of rejection and depression full upon me, so heavy I could barely breathe.  And Sweet Jesus I just needed to breathe.  So I went outside to watch the grass.  Somehow watching slender green blades reach toward the sky helped me forget the pain of my brokenness for a moment.  And I could sense God was there with me, Big and Enough to make grass grow.  Big and Enough to rescue me from my own sadness.

Oh that was so long ago.

I can't help but wonder what my little one sees when he looks at me. 

Does he see the woman who knows that God is Big and Enough or does he see the one who needs to spend some time watching the grass?  Does he see me living in faith?  Or does he see me as the one who wonders about God's faithfulness?

Maybe this is what it means to enter the Kingdom of Heaven as a child.  To have child-like faith that takes each moment as it comes, full of hope and love, ready for the next adventure, open to the Promise of the day because the Promiser can be trusted, eyes to see the Glory of God bursting out all around.

Amazing Grace how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me.  I once was lost but now I'm found, was blind . . . .

But now I see.