Morning dove

Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice. (Philippians 4:4)

There is nothing we want and need more than joy amid the rampant cynicism and conflicts of our age. And there is no end to the ways human souls seek and fail to find it or that marketers try to sell it.

But it cannot be bought or earned. Nor do our successes guarantee it.

Joy can only be received as a gift. Fortunately, we live in the atmosphere of a Great Giver. Or so I find as I sit my weary self in the rocking chair by the window on this pale gray morning.

‘I hear you little bird,’ I say, as a dove coos outside the window. ‘Good morning. Let’s you and me enjoy the gift.’

The gift is this … one day … into which I and my friend in the locust tree have awakened. One more day neither of us created, requested or did anything to deserve. It just is, given, flowing from yesterday into tomorrow and the imponderable beyond, a river of life whose mysterious Source we cannot see or conceive.

Each of us has been granted a share of the life of the One who is Life, given our unique shape and form and way of being: me, a human soul straining to touch and name the Immaculate Generosity who has given us this day, while my friendly dove, much wiser, simply sits and sings the joy of the morning.

I should just sit and listen. I might learn something valuable about where joy is found.

But no, I turn from joy’s song, calling me home, to the weary news of the world where the wisdom of the dove is as lost to the accomplished and powerful as it is to me. There is no consolation there, no peace, just the noisy clamor of clashing wills.  

When will I ever, finally learn? Joy is right here, right now, as I wake, alive to the gift of life from life’s unimaginable, unspeakably generous Source.

It flows through my veins and courses through my heart. It surges in my hope as I study rose stems for fresh buds of spring. It shines in my eyes as I crane my neck to see geese and cranes plying the sky to their summer home. It sings in my laughter as I eat pizza with my beloved and wake to the goodness of loving and being loved.

In all of it, I feel and know Life is in me and I am in Life, which is to say I am in the Love God is—the Love who is endless generosity, the Love who seeks us every waking moment, the Love whose pleasure is giving life to me and the dove, hoping we just might learn to sing.

Knowing oneself in this Love is the joy for which the heart longs. And as the dove knows, when it comes to entering this joy, singing is much more effective than thinking.

David L. Miller