I’ve been seeing the preschool teachers’ cars in the parking lot as I come to church each morning—I am so looking forward to hearing the children on the playground outside my office window! In our button-pushing modern world, very young children remind us that there is much to learn and much living to do outside of our (definitely handy and sometimes even fun) electronic devices: the sheer exuberance of movement, the uninhibited freedom to call out loud, and the immediacy of the small things worth noticing, like the ladybug or the strange caterpillar.

These, too, are blessings, offered to us quietly. Without liturgy framing them, we don’t always notice these as the gifts they are, but God’s sheer abundant creativity is on full view in Western Pennsylvania. Yesterday I was greeted by a fawn as I pulled into the parking lot—and then another. The water flowing all around us in rivers and runs still astounds me after my years in Southern California. The yellow tiger swallowtail butterflies have been floating in and out of my front garden, and the bees are quietly working the flowers, storing resources before the weather cools.

Take a moment this week to breathe, to notice, to consider what God has put before you. And then take a moment—it doesn’t need to be long—to breathe a “thank you” to the One who creates and sustains us all.

Prayer

God of all things, including the small, quiet things,

Help us to be present in the moments you give us.

Help us to see the gifts in our lives.

Help us to notice, and help us to see you in those moments.

Even as we struggle, as we work and aspire and achieve,

Help us to stop sometimes,

and breathe in and out,

and look around,

And know that you are continually blessing the world.

Amen.