Soul Magic -- by
FOUR FOOTED WONDER
Seen any miracles lately?
Our collie pup, Zara, is three and a half months old and getting out for longer walks. There’s some wild land nearby that she just loves! As I walk along (keeping up a brisk pace) she tends to run in a spiral fashion; out to one side, around in front, back in the other side and just behind wherever I am before setting off on her next circuit. Sometimes she will stop to worry a patch of grass or get diverted by “rounding up” some wind-blown litter.
Each of these little diversions is inevitably followed by a quick check-in around my ankles. Because even though she likes running wild she still needs the security of being at my feet.
Which is where the problem comes in. You see my eyes look out on the world from a space just under six feet off the ground – and I tend to look outwards, especially at sunrise or sunset when the light might be bad.
Being black and white Zara is easily lost in the shadows and because she is still a pup I’m not always sure of her ability not to get lost. So many times so far I have stopped and looked out, trying to catch sight of her. Then I trip over her because she’s at my feet!
It struck me the other morning (I was still half asleep and, therefore, philosophical) that most of us look for faith and miracles like that. We look out, we look for them happening somewhere else, to someone else. Almost as if we want to see them safely from a distance before making up our mind if we believe or not.
But all the while miracles are at our feet! Let’s face it; our feet are pretty marvellous when you think about how they are made and what they can do.
Years before I found anything like faith I sat in a college biology class watching as the lecturer described the workings of a muscle. It was engineering of an extremely complex level. There was nothing random or accidental. It was fantastically intricate. I came closer to believing in a Grand Designer in that class than I ever had at church.
There are twenty of those marvellous muscles in each of our feet!
Albert Einstein is supposed to have said we should live as if nothing was a miracle or as if everything was. When you are looking for wonders, my friend, don’t look out in the distance. Look in! You are wonderfully made!
And in my case, I should look down because little Zara is a miracle. She gets more wonderful every day – and soon she’ll be too big to fall over!
— © by
“Finding the extra in the ordinary.”
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