Isn’t amazing how we miss the beauty of something right in front of us because we are yearning for what is beyond?

I’ve changed where I have my quiet time with the Lord so that I sit by a window in the back of the house. As I sat there this year, I have been able to look at the sky and the hillside beyond. I’ve enjoyed this view; being able to see the different birds flying in the sky; watching the trees swaying with the wind; the clouds making their pattern in the sky; looking at the rock patterns on the hillside.

When the leaves begin coming out, the tree in my backyard blocks my view of the sky and the hillside. I was grumping about this to myself and to the Lord one day, when a bird flew into my tree limb and began to clean its feathers. When that bird had flown away, another one came and ate it’s lunch of worm.

I had beauty right there in front of me but I was missing it because I was yearning for the view of the sky beyond. I had a front row seat, an up close and personal view of the birds on the tree limbs, that I would never other wise be able to see that well.

I wonder how often I have missed the beauty God provides right in front of my face because I’m looking farther off, yearning for something that is just out of reach or out of view. Have I missed the beauty of a smile or a hug because I was looking farther off at today’s schedule? Have I missed a shared moment of laughter because I was yearning for everything to be in its right place? Have I missed a moment of being with some one because I’m focused on an event that is just out of view in the planning stage?

Sadly, the answer is yes. When I think of it, I have missed a lot of the beauty that God gives to me as a gift each moment, each day and in each person. Sadly, I would say that I’m not alone in missing this beauty. We get so caught up in our schedules, our plans and wanting things to be just right, that we miss the beauty that God places right in front of us. I’m not just talking about the beauty of creation, but the beauty of the people God places in our lives, the beauty of God's Word, the beauty of God's Church and the beauty of Salvation. Sometimes we just can’t see the beauty that God places right in front of us.

I am going to strive to see the beauty in what the Lord places in front of me. Won’t you join me? Let us all take time during the day to look around us at what is right in front of us. I guarantee that God has put a beautiful gift right there, right in that moment, if we only take time to look right in front of our eyes.

Pastor Mary Zimmer serves the Grantsville United Methodist Charge (consisting of Brooksville Church and Knotts Memorial Church), and shares her home in Grantsville with her only child, a very spoiled dog named Sugar.