As my attention turns to the final edits, pagination, and printing of my dissertation, I fill this space not with my thoughts, but the very appropriate words of Malcolm Guite, who offers this sonnet on this Feast of the Annunciation:
We see so little, stayed on surfaces,
We calculate the outsides of all things,
Preoccupied with our own purposes
We miss the shimmer of the angels’ wings,
They coruscate around us in their joy
A swirl of wheels and eyes and wings unfurled,
They guard the good we purpose to destroy,
A hidden blaze of glory in God’s world.
But on this day a young girl stopped to see
With open eyes and heart. She heard the voice;
The promise of His glory yet to be,
As time stood still for her to make a choice;
Gabriel knelt and not a feather stirred,
The Word himself was waiting on her word.
Gabriel knelt. The Word waiting. What powerful images. May your week be filled with opportunities to announce God’s Word, leading to hidden blazes of glory in God’s world.
Peace.