Before My Face

"For David speaketh concerning him. I foresaw the Lord always before my face... Acts 2:25.

More times than not, I have failed to see the face of God through other people, events and
circumstances as I travelled the busy road of life. Yet, there are times I have caught a
glimpse of the face of God before me. But when I looked back in search of these times,
I found three I had taken time to write about, all in 1994.

Sunday, March 7, 1994, on hearing the University of Arkansas-Pine Bluff Choir in
Cincinnati, I wrote in my diary, "I saw God today in the melodious voices of the
vesper choir. O, how my heart burst forth with joy."

Good Friday, April 1, 1994, on attending Good Friday Services at Sacred Heart Church,
I wrote, "I saw God today in the veneration of the cross and the symbolic act of the
priest kissing the Blessed Christ Jesus who died for my sins."

Easter Sunday, 1994, I penned these words: "Today, I saw God-
In the unexpected snow flurries as I journeyed to Easter Sunday Service.
In the power of the choir and trumpets proclaiming Christ's resurrection.
In the innocent faces of the children who participated eagerly in the children's sermon.
In the eighteen easter lillies that decorated the sanctuary.
In the pulsating energy in the hand of Ruth Pressley as we held hands during the
Prayer for the Community.  In the beauty of the lyrics,
God give me a clean heart that I may follow thee.

Sometimes, we do not see the face of God because of lack of spiritual consciousness
or insight, inattentiveness to spiritual matters, preoccupation and distraction with
matters of the ego. I have been guilty of all of these.

In 1998, I went on a mission trip to Mexico with Borderlinks through the Synod of
the Covenant, Presbyterian Church, USA. A memory that remains with me is spending
the night on a cold concrete floor in a colonia with a family of seven who gladly shared their
little earthly possessions.  I was blessed. Love was all around me. The presence of God was before
my face.