Peace, my word for 2022

 

Peace like a river,

A wall of water.

You can't outrun it.

It piles up at the feet of a sinful man.

"You can't touch me," he tells it.

But in his heart he hopes it will,

that it will reach him too and

take him with it

to the promised land.

I think it will.

Peace is my Word for 2022

It's going to be great.

War was my Word for 2021, though I didn't tell anyone. 

I think we've had a People war this year, not a Weapons war. 

Old ways falling, new ways replacing them, people changing, 

that sort of thing. Now it's time for peace. 

I can't even imagine what it will be like. 

Do you think we've been in a war? Do you think it's over?

Are These Poppies?

Are these poppies? 

"Yes," he said. "Do you want to hear a story about them?"

He liked to say he was older than dirt. He truly was, I believe.

"I remember the dead," he said. 

"There was an invisible soldier. It was long ago, before you and all of your people. He wasn't really invisible," he continued, leaning in with a smile. "But sometimes people think they are one thing or another when they are not. Do you know you are like that? You remind me of him. He was brave. Who am I kidding? He was naive. That works too, you know," then a subtle nod as if he were recalling something specific, and back to the story.

"His name is unimportant, to you, but its meaning is central to the story. Lion-hearted. He had no fear. He was obedient. If he had an order he followed it. You are like that, getting better each time," he nodded again and smiled. "Lion, I'll call him."

He went on, "Lion was stick thin when he was a child. He was not only small, he felt small. He felt insignificant, invisible, tiny. His voice was a peep. His toys were small. His heart was small. His imagination was small. Oh, but he wanted to be a hero, to fight and overcome."

He paused for a moment.

"No one else saw him coming," he chuckled. "But I did. I was the only one aware of his capabilities. He was not invisible to me!"

He hit his chest like a proud ape. It made me laugh. 

"I'd been on patrol that day with the men. The enemy was hiding all around. They were giant. My men were not. But their size made the enemy easy to see and I watched them. They surrounded us, plotting and planning, waiting, thinking. It would be to no avail, I knew, because at the crucial moment the enemy would not move ahead. They would remain cemented in place and my men would march on by, step by step, without realizing how close they'd been. It can be a good thing not to know. Knowing is sometimes just a distraction."

I nodded. I still didn't know what happened.

He smiled, "I'm getting to that."

With a glint in his eye, he continued, "Lion was the first to see the soldiers, some wounded, some already dead. They were stacked. Yes, stacked. Someone had done this deliberately. They were dragged and placed and unable to move unless the one on top sprang to life. The message was clear: fear us. I saw my men, one by one, assume fear. It blinded them and they began to scatter and search for cover. But not Lion. He couldn't reach the man on top. He couldn't move the man on the bottom. He could not see around them or past them or through them. Lion closed his eyes, bowed his head, and said a prayer in a small, tiny, stick thin voice that became stronger with each word. He was shaking when he started, but not when he finished. 

'What are you doing,' one of his men hissed from the safety of an overturned tree.

Another added, 'Stop!'

'Why?' Lion asked.

Why indeed? Why stop?

He pointed to a tall tree in the distance. It was standing upright.

"That's the one they hid under," he said, assuring me it was true. "It was one of the things changed by Lion's prayers. First, healing for the man holding all the others down, then for the others. One by one. There was hardly a break between his prayers for the injured and for those who were only hiding. Tiny, lion-hearted Lion stood and prayed even when the enemy returned, even when the firing started again, even when the dead soldiers stood up and the living ones snapped back into place, as if their injuries had propelled them. His men began to stand with him, only some of them at first, and then, when they realized the enemy could not hurt them, the others; not bravely, to be sure, but obediently, and each of them became brave because of it."

He paused and asked me if I understood.

"God moves," he explained.

"And the poppies?" I asked.

"The poppies are for remembering those who were lost," he said. "But they also remind me of these men. In the end, we didn't lose even one that day."

War

Praying for Syria this morning.

Why

Why

Why

Why

A War

Deliver me, O Lord, from evil men; preserve me from violent men,

who plan evil things in their heart and stir up wars continually.

Psalm 140:1-2

The Tree

The tree stretched long branches across the immediate sky, a shaded barrier between here and the brilliant azure above. It seemed to reach down to the young boy sitting underneath the expanse. He looked up and smiled. His mind was full of expectation. The tree was his friend. It gave him shade and hope and, on breezy spring days like this, a bit of wisdom.

"Was it always like this?" The boy asked, in regards to the War.

"No," said the tree with a wave of his branches. He sighed and tried to explain. "Long before now, when the trees were all small and young, when the grass was still learning to be green, when the sky above was not as blue..." He trailed off, but then continued, "When we were still dependent on the Creator we were uncertain and cautious. And we looked to Him all the time. He guided us. He was training us how to be, how to do what a tree does, what grass does, what a boy does." He smiled and added, "There was no war then. No one told us there could be and we didn't think of it."

The boy nodded. The list of what he'd lost grew day by day. It outnumbered what he still had, well, unless you count the tree. He had memories and photos, a few drawings. He had time held in a bottle on his nightstand. He'd caught it the day of his biggest loss, so far, and held it tight. He would never open that bottle. Never.

The tree seemed to hear his thoughts. Time would pass anyway he knew, but he kept that to himself because his friend was in pain. He reached down and held the boy close the way time was held in the bottle. He knew, like time, his friend would change and grow and become different, but he kept that to himself too because the thought of it gave the tree pain.

They sat for long moments like that, each hoping nothing would change. The tree, with his memories of how things could be, and the boy with time held tightly, afraid that any further moment would bring loss. They were like stone, unmoving, frozen. 

Nothing could break them free until the sun intervened. It was higher than they and could see farther. It could see peace approaching, still some distance away, but much close than either the tree or the boy could imagine. It spoke, boldly and with great power, "It's almost here!"

But the two didn't speak the sun's language. They didn't even realize it was speaking. To them, the communication was just rays of light pouring in and bouncing randomly. A beautiful spectacle to be sure, but meaningless to them otherwise.

The sun tried harder. It screamed and shouted and waved its flares. No response. The boy and the tree sat utterly unmoved by the good news. 

So the sun sent the wind. It roared and billowed and tried to tell them as well, "The sun says peace is coming!" But they could not understand the wind either.

The wind and the sun huddled together, trying to come up with a plan. They decided to ask water for help since it was easy to move. It was quite effortless for it to flow around the base of the tree, but the water could not be understood either. It only made the boy climb high into the tree's branches in terror, while the tree was in fear for his roots.

The sun sighed. The wind rustled. But the water had an idea. He whispered it to them and waited anxiously to see what they thought.

The sun laughed.

The wind nodded.

It would work, they thought.

And, so, the sun and the water and the wind called to the earth. It shook from its long sleep, quiet at first, but inspired when it heard of their dilemma. It was flattered that they'd thought of it and was eager to help.

It moved. A little at first, then more, soon defiantly and with abandon as if it were dancing. The boy held tighter and tighter. The tree feared even more for his roots. They cried out in terror, but what was happening was good. The ground rose in unison like a mountain being moved all at once. The tree with its roots intact, the boy at the top holding on, and all that they knew, all that was of them, rose and rose and rose until they were higher than they'd ever been. In fact, they were higher than they thought possible. They felt like they were as high as the sun. They'd been terrified, but everything had turned out fine. They weren't where they had expected to be, but they were somewhere. 

And the boy looked around.

"Tree," he shouted. "Look! Peace is coming!"