The rain in its liquid grace falls steadily on the broken limbs of many trees damaged in the recent snow storm of drought-stricken Colorado.
From the foothills to the great Rocky Mountains, downed and splintered trees appear in significant numbers.
It is painful to see the beautifully limbed towers of Ponderosa snapped in half, the soft, light-colored wood of Aspen stripped away by the force of wind and snow.
And yet, the earth still rotates and spins in its daily rhythmic dance on the journey around the sun.
But today, the sky is gray with heavy clouds, and the air is soaked with the miracle of water. Perhaps this much needed deluge is not only drink for the drought, but baptismal in kind.
Perhaps the broken trees, yet-erect after the weighted trauma of storm, are nourished in their brokenness, as we humans can be nourished to heal after tragedy, sickness, or disappointment. There tends to be a brand of humility or “gift” in some unusual turn that raises the human heart back to God. We lift our eyes above the tops of the broken branches, above the distress of hard times, to the divine embrace waiting there.
How does one describe the feeling of being heaven-held after sorrow?
Safe? Warm? Protected? Loved?
This past week, a piece of driftwood caught my attention on the rocks around Dream Lake in Rocky Mountain National Park.
Bleached white with weather and age, the wood was a mystery as to what genus or species beheld its origin. But to my eyes from a distance, the driftwood had the shape of an angel, its wings folded forward over praying hands as it kept sentry over the lake and forest beneath Hallett Peak.
Somehow that small, natural, and angelic wood sculpture seemed especially fitting as a caricature of resilience and as a sign of hope. Over the broken tree limbs and trunks, over the newest green saplings reaching to the sky from the forest floor, that driftwood angel seemed nothing less than a creative spark of divine energy revealed in the mystery of perfect timing.
I love to be surprised by the wonders of creation, especially in the context of loss or disruption. Life is indeed worthy and is not only good, but very good.
Genesis 1:31
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