Holding On To the Moments That Hold Us Together

My word for 2024 is behold. It's a word that challenges me to take in as much beauty as possible, to put myself in the path of oncoming beauty as frequently as I can, with anticipation that each moment of beauty is only the beginning of the story.

It's based on God, and his frequent call in the bible for us to behold. Behold as an invitation to discover the beauty beyond the beauty.

But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid! For behold, I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people: Today in the city of David a Savior has been born to you. He is Christ the Lord! And this will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger.”…

Behold.

As I prepare for the week ahead, I am struck that this time last weekend my the world was busy preparing for a solar eclipse. People were traveling across the country, arranging watch parties, scrambling to snag the last pairs of glasses. News channels racing to claim their spots in the path of totality.

My world was preparing itself to behold something spectacular. And they did. It was a beautiful thing.

Curt Thompson described what I witnessed eloquently. He said:

"The eclipse, with its stunning display of cosmic alignment, served as a powerful reminder of the interconnectedness of humanity and the natural world. It transcended geographical boundaries and cultural differences, uniting people from all walks of life in a shared moment of wonder and awe. In witnessing this celestial spectacle, we were reminded of the inherent beauty that exists in moments of collective appreciation and unity."

A collective appreciation and unity. A beholding.

But here I am, not even six full days removed from the event, and it's gone. There is no more talking about it. No more pictures shared. It feels like the awe has faded into a distant memory.

To be truthful, it doesn't feel like a memory at all.

The eclipse and the unity it encouraged feels more like a moment now and not an invitation. It feels like something we watched together while missing the invitation into togetherness.

Like many who observed the baby wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger, I wonder if we saw the beauty, but missed the sign?

It is not too late.

Life is constantly calling us into moments of collective appreciation and unity. We simply have to be more committed to holding on to the moments that we behold together.

We have to imagine them as something larger than an eclipse, something more meaningful than a baby.

We have to see the eclipse as ours. The ocean and the mountains and the streams as ours. We have to hear the birds as our birds and see the dolphins emerge from the ocean as our fish.

We have to see the sun and the moon as our day and our night.

Our.

Because behold, that is what the eclipse was asking us to feel in accepting the invitation to experience total darkness in broad daylight. It was always something bigger than that.

Behold, we are all in this together.

It's only been six days. We still have time to hold on to what we beheld. We still have time to discover the beauty beyond the beauty.

Unity.

It's ours.