I read a poem today from Lord Byron, Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage, one passage in it stuck in my mind so deeply that I wanted to share it with you:
“There is a pleasure in the pathless woods,
There is a rapture on the lonely shore,
There is society, where none intrudes,
By the deep Sea, and music in its roar: “
As I read this I was transported to a forest where I stood and looked up into trees so tall I could barely see the top branches. The leaves were changing color and I was seeing the gold, red and yellow falling to the forest floor. I closed my eyes and enjoyed the view and listened to the “sound of silence”.
So many people in trouble, homes being swept away by floods, ripped apart by tornadoes, sickness gripping the guts of someone I care about, I pray for them as I sit quietly. And then I receive a little video of two chubby babies clad only in diapers just learning to walk playing in a sprinkler. There is happiness in that. A text comes in from a dear friend going home from the hospital and there is joy in hearing that.
Then I turn on the reader in my YouVersion Bible and listen to Psalm 91 and there I receive the comfort and pleasure for which I seek in the pathless woods.
It begins,
“You who sit down in the High God’s presence,
spend the night in Shaddai’s shadow,
Say this: “God, you’re my refuge.
I trust in you and I’m safe!”
And now I can walk out of the pathless woods and lay my head on my pillow, I am at peace.
Harolene.com 