Among the plethora of Kansas City’s gifts, summer boldly moves in. Vying for first place for best in show are: the buzz at the farmer’s market on Saturday morning; the crimson cardinal perched on my bird feeder; the fragrance on an evening stroll through Loose Park’s rose garden; and a carefree day at the K when the Royals win. Summer beckons us to savor a conversation with neighbors in the driveway or to sink our hands into the humus to plant and pick. Winter invites us inside to clean closets, but summer winks at us and begs us to relax and play. Pitch a tent in the backyard and let the children stay up past dark, telling ghost stories. Take a turn on the slide at the pool, even though you are the only parent doing so. Fall is about decay, and winter about dormancy. Spring breaks us open to the sometimes-treacherous path of rebirth, but summer simply delights.
What if God sent summer to shake us loose from the rigidity of our lives? What if God snickers when we eat ice cream? What if God boasted after God created that flower that only blooms up above the tree line in Colorado and then reclined in the easy chair of heaven, waiting to see if any of Adam and Eve’s descendants would notice that tiny pink flower. What if God is less worried about us saving the world than about noticing the world?
I think part of God’s love language is summer. Psalm 37 begins “Do not fret” because surely God knows how much we fret. The Psalmist enumerates our worries and our foes but reminds us that nature assuages us. God vindicates us by offering us a garden to dazzle and delight us. “But the meek shall inherit the land and delight themselves in abundant prosperity.”
In one of Wendell Berry’s poems, he writes about walking through nature on a summer day and he says, “Suddenly I know I have passed across a shore where I do not live.”
What if summer in Kansas City is one way God seeks to let us know that we are loved, just as we are, without doing anything at all?
Grace and Peace,
Carla
