Happy Songs of the Birds

It had been a while.  

Sure, we found ways to survive the heat-laden days of summer, getting fresh air in shorter stints closer to home.  We took delight in our garden, marveling day by day at its nourishment for body and soul.

We just hadn't gotten out.

You know, out where you can't hear city noises, out where you might not see another human except each other but even if you do they're out for the same reason you are, out where the birds don't have to compete with car alarms for the air waves.

This Sabbath, we simply did it.  Gathered up our water, bug spray, camera, and reading materials for the car ride, and got out there. 

Something somewhere was blooming full and free, spreading its sweet scent over the whole earth, it seemed.  I couldn't breathe in enough of it.

I couldn't capture any of the thousands of butterflies at a resting place, either, but that's a different thing altogether.

Those words we read in the car echoed through my mind in the quiet by the lake side as we walked its entire perimeter.  Words of hope, encouragement, admonition--stay strong in the Lord, don't worry, go straight to Him for direction, and He'll give it to you every time.  (Very loose paraphrasing, of course.)

By the end of the loop, I was more refreshed and ready for renewed service than I'd been in a long time.

"The things of nature are God's blessings, provided to give health to body, mind, and soul.  They are given to the well to keep them well, and to the sick to make them well....Nature is God's physician."  White, Ellen G.  Testimonies for the Church, vol. 7, p. 77.

"Seeing the flowers, plucking the ripe fruit, listening to the happy songs of the birds, has a peculiarly exhilarating effect on the nervous system.  From outdoor life, men, women, and children gain a desire to be pure an guileless."  Ibid, p. 86