Look Around You

Good morning! So, I thought I would share with y'all something I wrote several years ago that God has been bringing to mind as I struggle to keep my focus here on the road. I hope you enjoy and that maybe God will use it in your heart as He is in mine. 

Look Around You

He stepped onto the park’s path and felt the cares of the world draining away. He’d had enough of work and responsibility and caring without return. He needed something different…new…fresh…away from people…He needed peace.

As he looked around, he began to smile for the first time in weeks. This was what he needed.

 Sure, there was a drunk stretched out on one bench and a sullen teen with earbuds on another. A mother and daughter ignoring each other on the path ahead, an old woman sitting alone by the pond, and a child sitting listless on a swing as his parents argued by the monkey bars…but the man could ignore all of those things.

And he did.

(I got to enjoy some beauty, too, in Kernersville, NC)

He instead admired the beauty of the trees stretching toward the sun as they lay down their offerings of red and gold. He saw the peaceful ripples left by the mother duck as she led her family across the water. There was a joyful breeze singing “rest” to his ears and the soft grass danced with his feet.

This was good. This was a place he could go to get away and not have to care. He paused and thanked God for bringing him to the park.

Yet, there was something missing… Was there a better park somewhere? Should he come every day and eventually he would find contentment? He wanted simply to forget the world and bask in God’s creation, what was wrong? What else did he need?

Then, as though the wind paused its song to whisper in his ear, he heard “Look around you.”

“Yes, Lord,” he thought, “it is beautiful. You made a good thing.”

Then, again, “Look around you.”

What else was there? The trees, the pond, the path, the grass, the ducks, the sun…it was all marvelous and he was grateful.

“Look around you; look what I have made.”

The man looked again and, this time, he saw the people. He didn’t want to see them. People were why he wanted to get away.

“Look what I have made.”

So he looked and began to understand.

He saw the skill and strength still there in the hand of the drunk as he tossed his bottle straight into the trash 15 feet away.

He admired the smile of the old woman as the now-active teen rushed to pick up her dropped cane, then accepted her invitation to sit next to her on the bench.

He heard the mother and daughter share a giggle at the antics of two squirrels who ran across their path.

And he saw the child now skipping ahead of his parents as they walked behind him holding hands.

The man rose to go home as he felt wonder soak in to his very soul.

God made the park. The trees - He clothed. The ducks, He made to glide and the wind, He taught to sing. The grass - He coaxed to dance. But the people…

The people - He loved.