A Lenten Devotion by Karen Nell Smith
As I watched in the night visions…
Daniel 7:13
When the end is clear, the present takes on infinitely more meaning.
For 20 years, my parents lived in an old farmhouse. We loved that place…surrounded by rolling green fields, a huge red barn, an icy cold Vermont stream across the street. We’ve had many, many wonderful times together at the farm, including a tradition as a family of taking mid-night walks to the far meadow.
On the last night that we were there together as a family, at about 11 p.m., we all piled into my brother’s four-wheel drive truck and slowly drove through the fields to the back meadow. There, when we turned the truck lights off, the stars were absolutely amazing—no human light anywhere to be seen. You could see the Milky Way and millions of stars. It was a real night vision…a sense of family and community, a sense of humility at the beauty of nature, a sense of true thankfulness for all that this place—the farm—and these people, my family, my parents—have been to us, made more poignant because we knew we would be leaving the farm. We were coming to an ending.
I have learned that when the end is clear, the present, the “now” takes on infinitely more meaning.
Right now, we’re living in what some call a “threshold” time. The rest of our lives will be defined by “before the pandemic,” and “after the pandemic,” not unlike the way many who lived through 9/11 have defined their lives. It’s a time of ending and the beginning of something new, something not yet known. And that can be very frightening.
But knowing there’s an end can also be a gift. It’s an invitation to see with new eyes. It’s chance for honesty, and authenticity, and intimacy. It’s an opportunity to be fully in the moment in such a way that you won’t have any regrets, acknowledging that some things will never be the same.
It’s standing in a cold dark meadow with a vision of a million stars above you and knowing you have been truly blessed.
It’s a gift from God.
Open us, we pray, to the gift of vision. Amen.