Jose Humphreys

I spoke last Sunday on God’s song of goodness from Psalm 23. The Message version reads “Surely your beauty and love follow me.” Other versions read “goodness and mercy” instead of beauty and love. Irregardless, I love the statement. We often think that we need to chase after good things, meanwhile God has a conspiracy of beauty and love knipping right at our heels.

Honestly, I find it hard to focus on beauty and love, goodness and mercy. But I think the problem is our eyes aren’t trained to see it. We’re going to miss it, especially in NYC, because we’re taught to live in the maze of craze (ooh i just made that up). A connoisseur of art is trained to find beauty even when it isn’t obvious. And God’s art is all around us, the beauty of moments which oft are overlooked.

So I was thinking some of this through during a few melancholic moments this week. What is beauty and love in my own life? After some good reflecting this is what I came up with…

Seeing my son’s smile while he’s relishing a moment on a swing at the park. With dad meeting him at every swing back-with each nudge of my hand its like the first time it ever happens for him. Its enjoying the Jazz Mobile yesterday at Marcus Garvey Park when I didn’t know about it. I was walking the dog and was pleasantly surprised by it. It felt good to be around people on a nice Summer day enjoying the beauty of Harlem culture at its best. What else? Its stopping by this new Moroccan Restaurant on 116th Street called The Kiosk, and chatting it up with the owner Muner. He just started this venture and I pray every day that “beauty and love” would follow him in this venture. These moments are a spiritual discipline for a dreamer like me. One of my issues can be “selling out” my present moments for “lofty” pursuits and simply forget that goodness and mercy, beauty and love are with me, right here right now.

I don’t bode well with random surprises in life, unexpected things that keep me off balance. But this beauty and love thing…well, that’s one unexpected guest I’ll host any time of the day.