by Francie Thayer – Spiritual Director
Some days when I wake up, there is a musical refrain in my head. Frequently I can trace them back to something I heard on the radio on my 45 minute commute to and from work, but Saturday I had no idea where it had come from . I hadn’t listened to the radio all week (a good audio book instead.) I choose to believe that this is something God uses to send little messages, encouragements, and guidance to me.
The refrain this time? Lauren Daigle’s Look up, Child—
“Where are you now,
When the world is crumblin’?
Oh I, I-I-I, I hear you say
I hear you say
Look up, child, hey
Look up, child.”
So I took this little refrain with me into my Saturday morning exercise-walk-3-miles-around-the-neighborhood. The refrain ran over and over as I walked. “Look up child… hey hey…. look up child.” After about a mile and a half, I laughed out loud: I had been watching my feet and the pavement the whole time, even as I kept repeating the refrain… “Look up child.”
Smiling and shaking my head at myself, I brought my eyes up to look around… and what a display. There were evidences of God’s Presence everywhere: Winter trees silhouetted against a blue sky. Snow geese in disorganized formations landing in the fields. Canada geese in tight V-formations intent on where they were heading. Red tailed hawks watching for mid-morning snacks among the winter grasses. Bright red cardinals in the bushes, chip-chipping enthusiastically. And then, my favorite, the one that instantly draws me into awareness of God’s Presence. The bald eagle, halfway up the oak tree, watching, watching, watching.
“Look up child.”
When the busy-ness and responsibilities of my work and life hold me too tightly, I do that—I just put my head down and walk. But oh! what I miss when I forget to look up. The wideness of perspective when we do look up and notice the beauty that surrounds us in every moment changes everything in the work. It reminds me that God is in the surroundings, yes, but also in the walking, the pavement, the work the responsibilities. And when I remember that this Great Love is in all of it, there is freedom, and light and energy to carry me wherever the journey leads.
Give yourself a little gift… Look up.