The Dazzling Smile Of God

Saturday morning I woke at 3 O’clock and posted my journal entry about getting Fancy on Friday. By 4 o’clock I lay on an air mattress in the pool looking into the pre-dawn sky for shooting stars.

Yes, the annual Perseid Meteor shower explodes today and tonight.

I expected to see something like this display from an 1833 engraving:

What I actually did see was two shooting stars — maybe. Perhaps all I saw was a glint of light reflected from the line in my bifocals. I prefer to think I saw two meteors.

The full moon dominated the sky with so much light the stars were nigh invisible.

So, the morning panned out as a bust for astronomy but it proved valuable in another way. You see as I floated in the pool watching the faint stars, I sang.

And I worshiped the Creator of stars and moon and me.

I sang in a low voice so as not to alarm the neighbor’s dogs but I sang half-remembered hymns of praise to the Lord God.

I floated on water and on thoughts of His majesty and love.

No one else in the world seemed awake. Just me and the Beautiful Lord Christ.

I sang that ancient, 7^th Century Crusader hymn, Fairest Lord Jesus; and the recent hymn, How Great Thou Art; and a song I have never known the name of about an engineer’s worship while blasting rocks to build the Panama Canal.

As best I can remember that one goes:

Got any rivers you think are un-crossable?
Got any mountains you can not tunnel through?
God specializes in things thought impossible;
And He can do what no other power can do.

And I prayed. I know I’m not supposed to mention my prayers because that is one of the things Jesus commanded that we keep secret. So suffice it to say that I did not ask Christ for a single thing; I just appreciated Him and told Him that on some low level, I love Him.

And as I sang and prayed I thought about Judgment Day and I remembered this woman I saw once in the Post Office:

A line six or eight people long ahead of me stood waiting a turn at the window. Many more inched along behind me. Each of us minding our own business. Each of us carrying our own packages. Each of us shifting from foot to foot. Suddenly the clerk behind the counter shouted, “Oh, My God! Would you look at that!”.

As one, we all turned to look.

The most exquisite, gorgeous. woman I have ever seen, any person in the Post Office had ever seen, opened the glass door and stepped into the crowded lobby.

All conversation stopped. All business halted. A reverent hush settled over the place. And as she walked forward, the crowd parted before her, men and women moved aside and turned to face her like nobles making way for a queen.

She gave the tiniest of nods in modest acknowledgement for our adoration and proceeded unhindered to the counter. No one objected. Our line of people just stood on either side like an honor guard. I’ve never seen anything like that happen before or since.

But, here’s the oddest thing.

This regal woman looked in my direction and her face broke into a dazzling smile.

Dazzling!

Her smile radiated. It haunted. It glowed. It stunned me.

My spirit soared. This magnificent creature recognized me!

Then I realized that she was smiling at someone behind me, someone she knew.

Disappointment crushed me.

I saw her smile, it was aimed in my direction, but it was not for me.

I felt so ashamed at my mistaken presumption. That dazzling smile was not intended for me.

When she left the building conversations resumed, lines reformed. Life went on — but with something wonderful missing. I felt a sense of incredible loss.

Oddly enough, not once person mentioned what we had all seen and felt. Some things are just too important, too serious, to talk about.

Last night, as I floated in the pool below the stars, I recalled the opening chapters of the Bible where God smiled at His handiwork and pronounced it Good.

The thing He had done pleased Him.

Then I thought of that great and terrible day of the Lord when every person ever born will stand in resurrection before the throne of the Almighty and every single one of us will see Him smile.

We will see that dazzling holy smile of pleasure.

But some of us will realize that His smile of recognition is not for us; it is for someone behind us in the line. It is turned in our direction but passes right over our head and alights on someone else.

It could have been on us.

But it’s not.

Need any more horrid definition of Hell?

In the early days of U.S. history, in that 1883 meteor shower, some people panicked, thinking the falling stars signaled the end of the world. They confused the merely spectacular with the reality of judgment.

What a shame.

What are only a few falling stars compared to missing God’s smile?

I learned one important lesson during my dip in the pool — even when the day time temperature here in Jacksonville reaches 98, it’s still possible to freeze your ass at 4 a.m.!

Ginny woke at 6:15 as usual and she spent the first hours of her day coddling Fancy. That is one pampered bird. Ginny made kissy sounds and tried to teach the bird to talk. She wants it to say wimpy stuff like “Pretty Bird” and nonsense like that.

I hold higher aspirations for Fancy. I figure that a bird living in a writer’s living room should say something literary. I want Fancy to say:

Once upon a midnight dreary,
While I pondered weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore…”

If that bird is half as clever as Ginny thinks it is, then it should soon be able to recite all 18 stanzas of Poe’s Raven.

When I explained my idea to Ginny she laughed till she about fell out of her chair.

Of course the silly bird never says a word; it just chirps.

Guess how we spent the next five hours of our Saturday?

Shopping for a mirror and cuttlebone for Fancy’s cage! Yes, we searched two pet stores and a cosmetics store before finding just the right the mirror that suited Ginny for her bird.

She doesn’t spend that much time shopping for my birthday present!

But, since we had absolutely nothing else planned for today, we shopped for bird stuff and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. It’s been a glorious Saturday.

I’m writing this journal entry about 2 a.m. Sunday morning. I’ve just been back outside to look for shooting stars again, but rain clouds hide the sky tonight.

I hunger to see the stars again and think about who created them. I hunger to recapture last night’s sense of wonder and worship. I just remembered that long ago I wrote a fluff piece about this kind of hunger once. Sometimes, most times in fact, I forget that we daily walk amid ordinary wonders.

Oh, by the way, earlier this evening the Jacksonville Jaguars won their first pre-season football game.

And, as sportscaster John Madden said, “One in a row is a streak”.

And on that giddy note, giddy John Cowart is going to bed.

Wake me if the stars fall.