500 Branches 23 Burrs

Since I've been back from Springhill I've missed the forest and sunshine and plants and paths. Its been quite a change from walking half a mile to do anything, to driving my siblings all over the state everyday. (slight exaggeration) This morning after taking my brother to soccer at 7 45 AM I drove to the small bite of nature left in Flushing, Flushing Nature Park :) It seemed as though I had run through this place so many times, I had ridden my bike over ever hill, every root, ever secret path. Its small. But it was absolutely beautiful.

I walked through this park with jeans and a hoodie because its about 25 degrees cooler here than in Seymour, IN. Being there was comforting. I like being outside a lot. (Ironic that I'm sitting in a McDonald's writing this...) I've changed in that way.

So, as I searched for beauty and comfort in these fallen trees and uncharted paths I listened to a Village Church podcast about being content in Christ. It is an excellent idea to walk while you listen to a sermon or message because you connect different pieces of the message/different inspired thoughts/convictions with landmarks and places in the path. I highly recommend it.

Anyway...the story.

I kind of ventured off the cement pathway because, surprise, I wanted to travel a path along which all the other morning walkers weren't. I followed a long tiny bike path through some grass and climbed a hill covered in cement boulders. When I got to the top I was overjoyed to find more secret paths I'd never been on. My adventures began. I walked and walked and twisted and turned through these beautiful leaves, specks of sunshine, fallen tree trunks, and wildflowers.
After much wandering I came to the end of a path and found myself in a strange clearing. It was a circle of about 6 trees all quite large, tall, old, and dead. They must have been hit in a storm or something...I don't know. In the center of the trees was this large mud puddle. All around this circle were bushes and lots of poison ivy I'm sure. I sat for a while, then decided...I'm being adventurous, I can create my own path. So I stepped out onto a little foot trail that went for about 10 feet, and I keep digging my way through tons of branches, crawling through holes...etc. I ventured for about 5 minutes (not too long, shouldn't get lost) and decided to turn around because, well, there was green all around me and I couldn't see a way out.
I tried to go in the same direction, but of course after wandering for about 5 minutes I looked around and could not see any way out of this mess of vines and branches. I was very lost. Not to mention my arms were scratched from thorns, covered in mud, and my hair and clothes were COVERED in burrs. I continued to search the ground for a path. With much determination I pushed through these branches and just could not find a way out. Then it hit me, there was one very easy way out. All I had to do was look UP. If only I would look up, I'd be able to see the mud puddle clearing and find my way toward it. (even if I would be creating my very own path.)

How many times do we wander through life, and frantically dig for the "right path?"
How many times do we unnecessarily cover ourselves in mud, and allow ourselves to get scratched instead of calmly looking to God?
How many times do we forget that all we have to do is fix our eyes on the I Am?

"For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. 12 Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. 13 You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. 14 I will be found by you," declares the LORD, "and will bring you back from captivity."
Jeremiah 29 11-14

somewhere i have never travelled

somewhere i have never travelled, gladly beyond
any experience, your eyes have their silence:
in your most frail gesture are things which enclose me,
or which i cannot touch because they are too near

your slightest look easily will unclose me
though i have closed myself as fingers,
you open always petal by petal myself as Spring opens
(touching skilfully, mysteriously) her first rose

or if your wish be to close me, i and
my life will shut very beautifully, suddenly,
as when the heart of this flower imagines
the snow carefully everywhere descending;

nothing which we are to perceive in this world equals
the power of your intense fragility: whose texture
compels me with the colour of its countries,
rendering death and forever with each breathing

(i do not know what it is about you that closes
and opens; only something in me understands
the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses)
nobody, not even the rain, has such small hands

 -- e. e. cummings

I haven't thoroughly studied poetry...but right now, this is my favorite.
May this morning of sunshine spill over into the rest of your day.