Our Spiritual Journey Thursday theme this month is Change and Transformation. Visit our host, Leigh Anne, here to see what everyone else is writing on this topic.
These last few years have been times of huge change for my husband and me. This time three years ago, we were still living in Haiti, and since then we have lived on two different continents (three, if you count the weeks spent in the United States in between). I'm teaching a different subject now, and we're living seven thousand miles away from our kids, and I walk as often as possible in wetlands, getting my boots muddy and making a checklist of the birds I see.
Change is often frightening, especially when it comes unexpectedly. But it can also be life-giving. Wetlands are a symbol of change. Every time I go to Lake Victoria, the beach looks a little different. Sometimes the water is high, sometimes low. Sometimes it's rough, and other times completely smooth. There are different combinations of birds each time. The plant life is different. Sometimes there's a whole new "island" out in the water; it blew in from across the lake and will be around for a while. Wetlands are in between water and dry land. People speak of draining the swamp but that, of course, is the last thing you want to do, as the swamp protects against storms and flooding, filters water, and is downright beautiful. The swamp is always in flux.
Back in 2019, I wrote this post about change. I referred to the hymn "Abide with Me," and particularly the words "Change and decay in all around I see; oh thou who changest not, abide with me." As things change around me, in my work life, my family, and the world, I can trust God's unchanging love that will keep on holding onto me. I hope others can take comfort in this, and I'm thinking particularly of people cleaning up from Hurricane Helene, people struggling with war, and others dealing with huge change, well beyond their ability to control it.
The bird prompts for today are Bluebird, Eastern Bluebird, and Ross's Turaco (which is a very blue bird, and which I wrote about and shared pictures of here). (See the calendars below; one is a US-based calendar, one is more international, and one was made by a colleague and is fully Ugandan.) I decided to choose the international calendar for today, but I've written about the Mountain Bluebird, which is found in the United States.
Mountain Bluebird
I held your hand
while you told me something about you
I didn’t know before.
We laughed and cried and adjusted.
And the Mountain Bluebirds flitted around the whole time,
being so purely blue,
and filling me with hope
that we could weather the changes coming,
just as these pieces of sky catch bugs
and migrate and
make the best of it all.
©Ruth Bowen Hersey
2 comments:
Ruth, I love this line:
hope/that we could weather the changes coming
Is not Hope the greatest sign of faith? I hear it in your love for the swamp, those magnificent bluebirds, and in the taking of someone’s hand. Thank you for sharing this post.
Your mountain bluebird picture and poem are exquisite. Thanks for introducing us to your wetlands. You have weathered much change indeed. It makes my change from WA to NC seem inconsequential, but I'm still adjusting and trying to make new friends in this new setting. These lines from your post resonated with me:
"As things change around me, in my work life, my family, and the world, I can trust God's unchanging love that will keep on holding onto me. I hope others can take comfort in this. . ." Our world (and we) need to trust his unchanging love. Thanks for your words. I also read your earlier post. I love the hymn Abide with Me. Abide was my word for the year once.
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