Tears

Tears. Some people cry often and for any number of reasons, while other people almost never cry.  For many years, I was accustomed to being in the second group, but I am finding as I grow older that I’m starting to cry more.  I don’t really know what to do with the tears.

What makes me cry? Here’s the weird thing. It’s almost exactly the same list that makes me smile. Most of the time that I end up crying, I am seriously annoyed with myself.

Those of you who know me well, or even just know me on Facebook, know how freakishly many pictures I take. My typical subject matter is anything of nature.  I like to take close-ups of bugs, bees, flowers, fall leaves, frost, snow, raindrops, baby birds, or just about anything growing outside my house. Each sighting of plant or insect or animal seems to me like a whisper from God. I seem to hear Him saying, “Take notice, Liz. This is a present, crafted by My hand, for you to appreciate. Look closely and truly see the intricacies of My creation. And ENJOY it!”  

So I smile, and sometimes I cry. I know I look like a crazy woman, because ordinary things in the world around me catch my eye. It’s almost impossible to take a walk with me, because I can’t help stopping for a mushroom here or a dragonfly there. I see them all. My eyes have reconfigured themselves to notice what most would consider to be minutia. Forget about texting and driving; I have a hard enough time just processing the beautiful world around me while driving. You should hear my self-talk when I’m alone in the car. It goes something like this, “Ooo – is that a hawk? Stop it, Liz, you need to look at the road….Those clouds are so amazingly cool! Seriously, keep your eyes where they belong, girl….” You get the idea.  I’m entirely messed up.

This past summer, R.J. and I took the trip of a lifetime. We were celebrating our 30^th anniversary. Since around the time of our 20^th anniversary, we had been planning a trip to Prince Edward Island. We drove. Oddly, R.J. chose to do most of the driving. Actually, he did it as a gift to me, so I could fully enjoy the scenery. (Here’s something sweet: when R.J. is asked what his favorite part of the trip was, he answers that it was watching me enjoy the trip. I am so blessed!) We took a week to drive out to PEI, which is located off the east coast of the Canadian mainland for those of you who are wondering. We stopped at the Baseball Hall of Fame, visited with friends (including former choir member, Christina Enger), drove up US HWY 1 in Maine, stopped at Acadia National Park, and finally arrived at Prince Edward Island after driving over the spectacular 8-mile bridge that connects it to the mainland. We spent a week exploring this paradise before taking another week to travel back home again. We went home by way of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, New York, Niagara Falls, Ontario, Mackinack Island, Michigan, and Wisconsin. As you might imagine, taking pictures was a big part of the trip for me. I took somewhere in the neighborhood of 2200 pictures over the course of those three weeks, and put a selection of them together in a lovely, little 74-page Shutterfly book.

Maps for all the states and provinces we traveled through

 There are certain moments from this trip that stick with me. We saw so much beautiful countryside, so much of God’s creation. Honestly, there were moments when all I could do was cry. Tears would form in my eyes as I took in the splendor all around me. I was truly in awe, blown away by the works of our God, and those annoying tears sprang from eyes and flowed down my cheeks.

I started thinking, if I’m going to be a crier, what should make me cry? I believe with all my heart that worship should do that same thing to me. It should stir in me, in all of us who believe in God, the feeling of gratitude, as we each know how unworthy we are of the gifts God has given us. It should throw us on our face in front of God. It should blow us away to think of the works of our God. We should be in awe! God’s voice, the one that whispers in nature, should shout to us in worship.

It’s a choir weekend, and our final worship song says it all: “Worthy, worthy, Jesus is worthy! Praise to the Son of man. Those who adore You bow down before You, worship the Great I Am.”

Worship, my friends.  And let the tears fall where they may.