In the spring of 2020 different sounds sprung up around my garden to accompany the menagerie of birdsong I always enjoy. While robins, doves, chickadees, and song sparrows sang and cooed their welcome of warmer weather and longer daylight hours, some other symphonies showed up alongside.
COVID-19 has been one of the most unwelcome visitors of the century. It’s been an unruly guest whose lingering stay has jarred the nerves of most nations and jostled the economies of all. We want her to pack up and leave.
But while she refuses to part—just yet—we’ve all grown accustomed to a new set of sounds emanating around us. At 7:00 each evening, clanging pots, honking horns, and ringing church bells remind us to be grateful for the service and risks essential workers engage in each day we’re in the midst of this global pandemic.
While COVID-19 clings to our world and threatens to permeate our personal protective equipment, we’ve also grown accustomed to the sounds of home-and-garden-renovating-enthusiasts who have more time on their social-distancing hands than ever before. Holy moly. I’ve never heard so many different types and sounds of power tools wielded all at once.
The whirs, the bangs, and the buzzes all around us are a continual reminder we’re experiencing a different kind of spring than ever before. Homes have become super havens and project places to help keep us safely distanced and distracted from the dangers lurking in store lineups and moistly-speaking mouths (Thank you, PM Trudeau, for this new made in Canada phrase.).
However, this COVID-19 cloud doth have a silver-studded lining. When we’re all safe again, we’ll all have lovely homes and gardens to invite our friends and families to visit. We’ll have no reason to procrastinate hosting a barbecue, a Bible study, or a dessert night because our nests will be tickety-boo ready for guests to ooh and ah over. We’ll also have no shortage of conversation to partake of as we discuss all the things COVID-19 blessed and cursed us with.
Yes, the spring of 2020 will be the small talk of big dinner tables for years to come. Let’s pray it’s spoken of in historical terms and not as a reoccurring nightmare lived out in real time hours; I mean, there’s only so much renovating a guy or gal can do.
In the meantime, online church services have facilitated a new sound of its own on Sunday mornings, as many homes in each neighborhood, many apartment units in each complex, and many rooms in each care home become mini-church sanctuaries with gospel and praise songs spilling forth adoration for the King of Kings who isn’t the slightest bit worried about what’s happening because He warned us in the Scriptures that these things must come to pass before He returns to gather us up and carry us to the Home-Sweet-Forever-Home our Father is busy preparing for us.
Listen to what John 14:2-3 NIV says: My Father’s house has many rooms; if that were not so, would I have told you that I am going there to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am.
Maybe, if we strain our ears enough, and stay still long enough, we’ll hear the drum of holy hammers. And now, I’d like to close with a poem:
No matter what’s wrong on earth
It’s not a problem for God
For He is busy building our home
On Heaven’s holy sod
No matter’s what troubling us
While we walk on this earth
God’s grace will more than make up
For any of sin’s curse.
~ wlm
Heavenly Blessings ~ Wendy Mac
I hope you enjoyed these photos from my garden. I’m nosy-to-know if you’ve been enjoying nature more because of COVID-19?
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