The April sun went into hiding for the weekend. Saturday was all grey here, and very windy. All the sand that has not yet been swept up from the streets after the winter, whirling around... Suddenly it seemed much easier to "believe" in that cloud of vulcano ashes that has been putting a lock on all our airports in Northern Europe over the last few days; leaving people stranded all over the world, suddenly not being able to go where they intended to go. Bad enough for those who were going away; and even worse for those headed back home (expected back at work, and having spent all their holiday money).
Yes, I do know that the clouds I actually see now are "ordinary" clouds. The news just seemed all the more incredible when I first heard about it, and at the same time saw the sun blazing down from a perfectly clear, blue sky! (Ashes? What ashes?)
A powerful reminder that we really have very little clue what's going on around us, most of the time!
"Ashes to ashes, dust to dust..."
A walk earlier in the week (still under a blue sky) took me across the town's oldest cemetery. It has a lot of these really impressive graves with huge memorial headstones in enclosures surrounded by heavily decorated iron fences. (I always wonder: Why? Yes, I can understand the need to mark the place... But iron fences?!)
But in the same cemetery I also found the hepaticas (cf previous post), growing "wild" outside the fences, reminding of new life...
“Earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust; in sure and certain hope of the Resurrection into eternal life”
~ Book of Common Prayer ~
Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away. No one knows about that day or hour, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father.
~ Gospel of Matthew 24: 35, 36 ~
3 comments:
Like you, it seemed strange yesterday and the day before to read of ash clouds and see such blue skies and sunshine.
A great Sunday post to get us thinking, and a very interesting cemetary. Perhaps the iron fences are a throwback to when people thought those fences would stop the restless spirits from wandering? The pretty flowers growing there surely show the cycle of life and death. About the cloud,and us not knowing what goes on around us, so true! It made me think of the bible verse that says we are surrounded by a gret cloud of witnesses. Now some people think this means we are being watched by those who have passed on, but the bible also says the dead know nothing of what goes on under the sun. Our pastor says the word witness just means witnesses for God. Something to think about, since this post is so thought provoking and interesting. By the way, I got a comment on my blog about that salty licorice. Stephanie V. says that the salty licorice has no sodiun in it!!! I don't know how she knows that, I've never even heard of it! But that would mean you could eat more of it. But chocolate covered bacon!! I've never heard of such a thing, and we have an international food store nearby. I'm guessing the bacon would be already cooked, because how could you cook it if it is dipped in chocolate?
what a nice place for walking and taking photos. there is a cemetery in Savannah GA USA where my mother and father are buried, and most of it is 300 years old, very old for USA I love to walk there. I wonder too, why the fences. i am sure there was a reason, now the fence is to keep out vandals here, there are big ones and lots of vandals.
thanks for the bible verse, you made me ashamed, I should have posted one today, as i always do on Sunday. to caught up in my computer troubles. thanks
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