The Results of Her Sculpting
I took the dog, Ladybird is her name, down to Cliff Creek for an afternoon hike last Sunday. It was one of those cold, clear bluebird days that we’ve been graced with in January. Lack of snow has made me grumpy at times this winter, but we make the most of what we’ve got. The road into Cliff Creek was packed solid from snowmobile traffic, and there wasn’t a sled to be seen. We had the whole drainage to ourselves. It was just what I needed.
This hike came on the heels of our Annual Meeting, where Jimmy spoke so eloquently about the state of our parish. He used the imagery of the primal elements that are so central to our scriptural stories, fire, wind, and water. The sun was blazing, the great light from the book of Genesis, the fire in the sky that fuels the whole biome, which fuels us and all living creatures. The wind was gusting, creating small snow whirlwinds, and blowing spindrift off the high peaks of the Wyoming Range. The spirit was moving me and the dog along our way, and sculpting the snow into what appeared to be waves on the surface of the deep, a frozen ocean. In places the ice on the creek was open, and water was running, skipping, making its way to its confluence with the Hoback, then the Snake, ultimately to the Pacific Ocean. Everything was alive on a cold January afternoon.
St John’s Episcopal Church in Jackson Hole is alive and well. We are our own little ecosystem, embedded in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, embedded in the crazy political ecosystem that is our country in this place in time, embedded in North America, embedded in the planet, our island home. From our story in Genesis, we are all Jacob, encountering God, wrestling with questions of who we are and what our place in this divine matrix is. We might find ourselves limping, but we are limping toward a future that is full of potential.
The wind of the Spirit is always blowing, sometimes fiercely, sometimes softly, so softly that we might not even notice it. That is, until we see the results of her sculpting. I see her handiwork in you, the people of St. John’s, and the good you are embodying in the world. I see her power in this church, creative and adaptive, as we discover new ways of being the body of Christ in Jackson Hole. I’m confident that she will blow us in the right direction and that we will be surprised where she blows us as we walk side by side into this new year.
Peace,
Brian
