Like Kisses in the Dark

I've had this poem by Elizabeth Barrett Browning on my mind all day. The beauty of this week--this first week in April, when every year the dogwood and wisteria, the azaleas and lots of tulips are in full bloom--fills me with cheer and courage.

Still, hard things are happening all around us. People get sick, crime abounds, stories of disaster fill the news. Sometimes it seems that God is not watching or that He doesn't care. This morning in Sunday School, we read the account of Jesus driving the money changers out of the temple and of his telling the Jewish leaders that he would raise the temple in three days. He was speaking of his body, but no one understood that at the time. Then the scripture says that after his resurrection, "his disciples remembered" (John 2:22).

It gives me hope to think that some day, after trials and struggles are over, I will look back and understand. In the mean time, we have the beauty of the natural world to remind us of God's presence. Here is the lovely poem I first learned many years ago:

A Child's Thought of God They say that God lives very high;
But if you look above the pines
You cannot see our God; and why?

And if you dig down in the mines,
You never see Him in the gold,
Though from Him all that’s glory shines.

God is so good, He wears a fold
Of heaven and earth across His face,
Like secrets kept, for love, untold.

But still I feel that His embrace
Slides down by thrills, through all things made,
Through sight and sound of every place;

As if my tender mother laid
On my shut lids her kisses’ pressure,
Half waking me at night, and said,
“Who kissed you through the dark, dear guesser?”

Elizabeth Barrett Browning

--Sherry Poff