As I walked the beach today, a
demonstration appeared before me. It was an ideal morning. The sun way at my
back and the air was crisp like a Friday night in fall. The beach was almost
empty making the sand a blank canvas sprinkled with life and painted by the
sea. I was walking for exercise but God was showing me an exercise. I picked up
several shells that immediately became a treasure hunt/prayer practice. As I
picked up each shell I imagined a soul that needed to be picked up in prayer. I
held it in my hand and brushed the sand and grime off and I did the same with
each shell too. There were more shells and souls than usual and I felt blessed
to be able to hold them.
On my way back, I realized that I was
walking back over my own footprints so I looked ahead to see where I had been.
There was a jogger’s set of prints not far from mine and theirs were virtually
in a straight line, which impressed me. My footprints, however, were anything
but straight and they resembled the ebb and flow of the waves on the sand.
Zigzagging up and down but with gentle and lengthy curves. Every now and then,
there was a straight path but mostly my prints meandered along the beach.
I could see when I stopped to look out
for any dolphins on the horizon, or to check out the diving albatrosses. All
those souls that I collected along the way had my prints leading up to them and
stopping for a moment to carry them away to the next soul. My prayer life was
laid out before me on the sand showing me that it must be free to move about or
it might just get washed away.
The to and from, the journey, the
treasure hunt, the stopping along the way, the gazing out, the picking up
souls: this is my spiritual life and God painted it on the sand to show me that
it must be a dance. I MUST dance my way to Him.
At one point I noticed that the ocean
had erased my prints and it made my heart sink just a bit. My painting was
flawed and not perfect. And then my heart sang at the knowledge that God clears
the canvas for us every now and then so that we can start the dance over and
this time it will be even better because we have been rehearsing.
So my walk by the sea this morning
turned into a dance with my Beloved and we meandered through an art gallery of
grace, collecting souls together and tossing them into an ocean of grace. May I always be able to see like You by the
sea. Amen
