Face of God in the Waves

I have bid a fond farewell to the ocean and witnessed the face of God.

Amid the crashing waves of Saturday’s 10PM hour I stood on a black sand shore. I have been to many “houses of God,” but in this house, I truly felt that I was in the presence of something grand. The black sand was my pew, the immense crash and roll of each wave my choir, the piercing moon and towering clouds my cathedral and rolling thunder of the distant storm my voice.

Each wave came in like the hand of destruction, blossoming out of a rippling sea to come crashing down upon itself mere meters in front of my person. The force of each wave shook the earth beneath me and the aftermath wrapped itself around me, oftentimes with such force that I was forced to dig in to the sand upon which I sat so as to avoid being swept away.

I stood or sat, depending on my bravery, watching the waves appear in the moonlight. Were I any sort of photographer, I would have been able to catch one of the myriad of moments that allowed me to witness a sword of lightning pierce the sky just as a newly born wave broke free from its under water bonds. Seconds after the strike, the thunder would roll through the warm night air adding to the majesty of the moment its own core rattling chorus.

The clouds were mammoth, towering beasts, holding God, no doubt, somewhere in their mighty midst. As I looked up at the sky I realized that no time, sweat or money need ever be wasted on a simple building ever again, not when God built churches such as this.

I looked up into the waves, the lightening and the clouds and said a simple thank you. Thank you for this moment, thank you for this time, thank you for this breath, thank you for the sight to see and the strength to follow that sight.

I leave Guatemala in one week. I said a thank you for my time here and I bid farewell to the waves, the heat, the smell of freshly cooked shrimp and Dorado. I bade farewell to the Reggaeton, the palm trees and the skinny little dogs. I allowed the ocean to swallow me up and spit me out and I turned and walked away.

This will not be the last time that I witness grand waves on an open sea, nor will it be my last time in Guatemala, but it is the last for this experience, this life altering existence that I have just survived.

I am not one to seek out God in a building, whatever its name may be. But, when the Creator shows Him or Her self to the land so very plainly, I will most certainly not ignore it. To be encouraged to experience every moment is part of the perfection of life. Would that all of us could experience every moment for what it is….miraculous in scale, mammoth in presence, perfect in my eyes.