St. Helen’s Daily Lenten Devotional
We hear them flying overhead, hundreds of them, on route to their summer vacation homes. “It’s Spring!” they honk, and we believe. Brief flashes of colour and the tell-tale squawks announce the return of the red wing blackbird, along with that classic harbinger of the season, with her rusty breast feathers as she goes ‘bob-bob-bobbing’ along. Lady cardinals outshine their preening mates, in haut-couture vestments designed by an Artist and nuthatches, chickadees, tuxedo-bibbed juncos, bold blue jays, finches, sparrows and the beautiful, but not brilliant, doves all return to join in the morning chorus.
To their Maker’s praise they sing and all Creation joins in the refrain.
The melody is timeless and while sometimes the overall effect is akin to a group trying to sing together on zoom, the message remains clear. It is Spring, in this part of the world, and the song resounds with the promises of the season, of warmer days, of budding trees, of the sweet elixir of maple gold, of growth and renewal. It is a gift of God, to be enjoyed, don’t let it slip away without noticing its splendor!
My beloved speaks and says to me:
“Arise, my love, my fair one,
and come away;
for now the winter is past,
the rain is over and gone.
The flowers appear on the earth;
the time of singing has come,
and the voice of the turtledove
is heard in our land.”
Song of Solomon 2:10-12