I watched two dry leaves, which were in the process of dropping to the ground, which got held back by strands of a spider web! The leaves were swinging in the breeze! I watched this for three days now. There were strong winds and a short spell of rain in the last three days. But the leaves are still hanging.
I have had to face some health related challenges recently which are age related. I felt consumed by them and lost the daily rhythm that I was used to. After three weeks of adjusting to return to the rhythm, I find the strength to hold on fading!
It was in this context of a new reality of constraints of age related health changes, I happened to see this sight!
A slender strand of a web holding the leaves together. How strong that strand would be to withstand wind and rain!
Our strength does not spring from the enormity of the security we create for ourselves ! It can spring from our feeble trust in what is given!
A video of a watchman after his duty, returning home with the lunch packet given to him from his work place, half a bottle of water given by a passer-by and a chocolate bar given by a child caught my attention. On reaching home he opened the lunch packet to share the meal with his bed ridden wife and a cat resident in their home. The meal looked insufficient, but the three of them looked content after the meal.
Their lives hang on a slender strand of trust and hope!
Can I feel content with what is given! The leaves did not have a choice. Their destiny was to return to the soil which gave them life to live. But they are given another experience of resting in the strand of a web!
During this interface between the life in the tree and their journey back to the soil, there is this surprise experience of being carried!
Between our birth and home call, I wish we can picture our life as being carried!
As I kept watching this unusual sight, scenes of my biography surfaced in my memory lane. A Bible verse that came to me at that time was: 'The Lord is my Shepherd and I shall not want'(Psalm 23:1).
M.C. Mathew (text and photo)
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