Thursday, December 5, 2013

Winds of Change (Sun Say and John Forte)


I am a lover of the wind. Having lived through many an earache from lingering too long in the not-quite-warm breezes of Michigan spring time, I have learned that I just can’t help myself (I have also learned to wear earmuffs and hats), if the wind is blowing I want to step out in it.
I love the feel (except in January) and the smell (in most, not all, locations) but most of all I love the sounds, the whistle, moan and woosh, the stir of grasses and leaves and branches, it’s echoing rush through city skyscrapers and canyons alike. 

I am not the first or only one of us to hear the voice of the wind:

 Ice Age 3

Today’s song seems to be trying to ‘speak wind.’ This wonderful and weird, hippie-esque, dance/rambling stroll- of a song (Oh, you’ll see) addresses The Wind, singing:
“Blowing wind, blow
Blowing wind, blow
Together we sing cheerfully
Then we sing cheerfully.”

In these musicians' estimation the wind is singing, and not only the wind:
“You fly south with the birds,
Forgetting the comfort of home,
They’re singing that the world won’t be the same again.
The gentle wind knows:
Don’t lose hope.”

 You can find a rough translation of the first verse here .

And it is a song we may join in singing. Though we don’t know the words. Quite literally, in the above song, as the first verse is in Russian; but perhaps like the wind, “we don’t need the words to say” in order to hear something. In this song, from the birds, on the wind. Like our ancestors who claimed “the heavens are telling God’s glory…their voice goes out to the ends of the earth,” we too might learn to hear the song in unfamiliar voices.

In this advent season we remember, creation is waiting too. “The whole creation waits breathless with anticipation for the revelation of God’s children.” Creation is very old, this mighty sky, this precious ground, for a long time it has been waiting; it's been resting, shaking, storming, breaking, recovering, humming, shining. The Apostle Paul tells us “all of creation has been groaning,” but I think sometimes it sings too, and speaks, testifies even. We are connected, creation and us (though we are taught to forget), bound in our destiny and so connected in this waiting, this longing, this pull of our God along the trajectory of hope. So take a moment today and turn your ear to the breeze, sing along with the birds, reach out your hand to the sunset and see what you can hear. 

"Change is in the air, your reach is everywhere and I want to hear you speak."
I want to hear the song, I want to hear the groan, I want the camaraderie of creation and I want to share it's wisdom in the wait.

The Lord will rejoice over you with gladness, renew you in love, and exult over you with loud singing.  -Zephaniah 3:17b (paraphrase)

God of Hope, sing, shout, and dance us, whisper, beckon, guide us along the way of redemption, as together we wait breathless with anticipation. 

-Lindsey

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