Passing shadow

Saturday in the Fifth Week of Lent

We are like a puff of wind;
our days like a passing shadow.
Psalm 144:4

The warmth of the sun pierces through the nippy spring air and I lift me face to its caress. I know this will be a brief moment, and sure enough a cloud scuttles across the sky and I pull my sweater closer around me to ward off the chill. This too is momentary; the shadow passes, and the warmth of the sun returns.

In the dance of sun and cloud, warmth and coolness, seasons and eras, I am a single gesture, making the smallest of marks and then gone. A reverie perhaps.

Yet if I am but a smallness, let me be a nod of recognition, a slow smile of encouragement, a wave of welcome, an open hand of love.

The Lenten path had led me here, once again. On the cusp of all that will come next, I take a breath and allow myself to be carried forward, a passing shadow, but nevertheless one that will not be lost in God’s redeeming love.


Image Copyright : Peter Vrabel