The first time we took Sage, a colicky infant who never slept more than an hour at a time, to the beach we were amazed at the impact of the crashing waves, the ebb and flow of the rising tide to calm and heal our sweet and anxious boy. I would strap him into the baby carrier and walk and walk and walk. I could have walked for miles then, so desperate for hands that could heal, a song that could soothe, an embrace that could lull my sweet unsettled baby to sleep. This great mystery of a sea that I had both feared and yet was hungry to understand as a child myself, was now offering the deepest knowing that one can ever find or receive; that love is present in many forms, and just as the tides of our life rise and fall the ever-present mystery of God’s healing love is as sure as the waters that crash upon the shore, one wave at a time.
We were back at this same beach, the one Sage calls “his” just a week ago. It is with gratitude for the mystery of life and its complexities that I return there each year as often as I am able, as if I need the expanse of the waters before me to remind me of my own place in the world. A kind of smallness that denotes a particular space, not less than or insignificant, but defined, named, and then more readily claimed as mine even as the swirling clouds of life are destined to form.
Last week as my children played in the sand, digging and building, smashing and smearing I shared with them a promise that has lived in my own soul for as long as I can remember, “God loves you so much, that God thinks about you as many times as there are tiny grains of sand on the ocean’s shore!” From Psalm 139: 17-18
How precious are your thoughts about me, O God. They cannot be numbered! I can’t even count them; they outnumber the grains of sand! And when I wake up, you are still with me!
As we reflect upon our own spiritual and religious heritage this week, with the flames of the Spirit still upon our tongues and resting within our stirring hearts, the Pentecost within each of us longs to emerge. The Spirit is calling us to dance off the pain and anger, the rage and fear that is growing among us, in the streets. So many of us, our own versions of colicky infants, are desperate to release the fear of our unsettled souls and to find our own place in a world fledgling as the tides continue to rise.
As we are witness to both the antidote and the venom, the birth of Spirit and the will to break her at every turn, it is upon us to find our own place, a sure-footing upon the water’s edge that will remind us that even as the tides change God’s love is as sure as the water’s that crash upon the shore, one wave at a time.
Let us pray as the Psalmist:
Where can I go from your spirit? Or where can I flee from your presence?
If I ascend to heaven, you are there; if I make my bed in Sheol, you are there.
If I take the wings of the morning and settle at the farthest limits of the sea,
even there your hand shall lead me, and your right hand shall hold me fast.
Spirit is leading the way,
Rev. Jenny Shultz-Thomas