Spring Peepers, Healing Prayers, and a Patient God

On Friday, in the rain, I went out to to Jefferson Lake, to see how the Spring was coming along.

The lake was noisy with spring peepers, peeping so loudly it didn’t even seem real. Surely nothing that really exists could sound so much like a cartoon. I was noisy as a cartoon myself, squashing and squelching with every muddy step. The rain pelted, dotting the surface of the lake. All that I could see was wet and cold and dirty and impractical, a glorious mess. The sides of the trail were dotted with Harbinger-of-Spring and Spring Beauty.

Further down the trail I surprised two grebes on the lake. If you want to know the difference between a grebe and a duck, just say the word “grebe” out loud. That’s the sound a grebe makes when they take flight, and that’s how you know it’s not a duck at a distance. They fluttered over the water’s surface, too fat to fly but flying anyway, and disappeared among the reeds at the far shore.

I’ve often asked God the Father what made Him so angry the day He created me. But I think He must have been feeling terribly whimsical the day He created shore birds.

I got to the bridge out behind the dam, and I watched the water gliding under me until I felt as if I was the one who was moving. And I prayed.

God, all things revealing. God invisible. God all-enlightening. God is present in darkness. God beyond the universe. God is present with me. God of pure delight. God here, suffering. God of justice. God of mercy. I am afraid of you, but I also remember when I rejoiced in you. I’m afraid you don’t love me because I can’t follow the rules. I’m afraid you are angry because the religious trauma is still so severe. 

Up a steep hill and down again, under those hemlocks, down those crooked steps and onto the pier. The pier wasn’t still as it was when I drove out and saw the ice. It was bobbing up and down, because the water that froze in December was alive and free again. I wanted to dive into it, if only it had been May and not March, but of course it was too cold. Water holds its temperature much longer than air does. The time is coming when I’ll go swimming again, if only I’m patient a bit longer.

At that moment I wasn’t afraid of an angry god at all.

An angry god couldn’t create Spring.

On Monday, still in the rain, I went to the waterfall at Frankfort Mineral Spring.

The skunk cabbage was up, looking rubbery and somehow alien as skunk cabbage always does. The moss was bright green while the forest floor was still mostly drab. A few sprays of Spring Beauty dotted the sides of the path, and there was coltsfoot near the parking lot, but those were the only flowers. The glory of peak bloom won’t come for a month yet. Again, the God who created the Spring ordained the flowers to come out slowly , bit by bit, so I have to be patient.

A God Whose creation requires such patience must be a patient God. Perhaps even patient enough to wait for me to heal and not be angry.

Up and around to the grotto, where every last shard of the ice was gone. There was the rust-streaked cliffside with the hemlocks on top. There was the waterfall, alive, the drops looking like quicksilver on the cloudy day. It churned the water in the stream into a milky cloud that flowed back down between the shale cliffs, noisy, irreverent, alive. Vidi aquam egredientem de templo, a latere dextro, alleluia: et omnes, ad quos pervenit aqua ista, salvi facti sunt, et dicent, alleluia, alleluia.

Streams of water bless the Lord, give Him glory and praise forever! Streams of water bless the Lord, give Him glory and praise forever!

I’ve got peace like a river, peace like a river, peace like a river in my soul! And it goes like a river, and it flows like a river, and it goes like a river in my soul. 

I wanted to stand under the waterfall until I was soaked to the skin, but it was too cold.

I hiked back to the parking lot next to that blessed noisy stream, at peace.

I am healing, though it takes time.

It’s going to be all right.