March 2025 Flash💥Devos ~ Thank You!

Thank you to all who’ve been praying with me during March as we celebrate Divine mercy. Today’s thank-you gift is a Lenten revelation about attuning to Christ’s suffering through experiences I had at Prairiewoods, a Franciscan Eco-Spirituality Center in Hiawatha, Iowa. May the gift of reconciliation come to you through nature as well, a reciprocal movement of loving forgiveness that shifts how we live in the world.Bouquet of Thorns by Marianne Abel-LipschutzA direct encounter with Jesus in a locust tree taught me how God shares life with each of us individually. During a 2015 Prairiewoods retreat called, “Beauty is the Path to God’s Life,” led by Father John Quigley, OSF, I discovered some answers to questions I had about reconciling suffering and hardship. Honestly, the world looked weary that first day through the meeting room windows; a late winter gloom of overcast skies lingered after a frigid winter.John spoke eloquently of God’s desire to manifest love through the vivid realities of the created world. A perfect example of this yearning claimed space on a table set with a white cloth. A torso-sized bouquet of extravagant flowers in a glass vase arranged by Sister Rita, FSPA, stood like a silent but flamboyantly-dressed person right next to John. The upright plant stems drank living water, softening the textures of dozens of petals and leaves as the hours passed.The marvelous flowers revealed God’s presence clearly, a counterpoint to the drab day which was a better representation of my broken heart. I had been feeling condemned through some harsh life events, and felt doomed to bear this time in silence. But John urged us to see God’s creativity as pervasive. “God is not just doing beautiful things. God is not just making nice flowers and pretty pictures,” he commented. “God is always breathing, always expressing.”I walked in the woods when the skies cleared the next afternoon, attuned to a revelation of God’s desire that John encouraged us to expect. The world was waking from winter dormancy. My feet left prints on the soft earth below the mulched trails. Not many birds called from the trees and no critters skittered past me.A handful of skinny fingers pointing outward from a tree trunk caught my attention. I saw thorn clusters wrapped around the tree at eye level. It was the weekend after Easter, and an image of the crown of thorns flashed in my mind’s eye. I felt like one of the bystanders on the Via Dolorosa, a witness to the awful suffering that comes with great love. Further down the path from the thorn-rimmed, honey locusts, I watched while a maple tree wept, sap seeping from the gray bark down to the cold ground like a waterfall of tears.This profound spiritual encounter with God was an intense lesson in becoming one with the suffering of Christ. Not that I could feel his level of suffering; this was my human experience of his human experience. Even the trees took part in his suffering.Romans 8:17 Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory.When I returned to the honey locust grove in June to take some pictures, God was still waiting for me there. It was a lightly rainy day. Cool raindrops fell off the leaves as I walked up to the grove on the hill.The tree I met three years ago was still there, too, but the thorns were shockingly alive, flushed red with the lifeblood of spring. I touched the fresh stiletto points of surprisingly soft thorns. The blood of Christ flowed out through the tree to reach me. Like Thomas, I had doubted my ability to connect with God’s love again.The oxygen-rich, blood-red new thorns growing over and into and around the old gray clusters embodied the energy of Christ’s living and dying for us. Hope is not just in my nature, dormant. As a child of God, hope is my nature. Experiencing this incarnation of God’s almighty presence offered sacred time to touch, and see, and arouse my desire to share this gift with others.A version of this article first appeared on 19 March 2019 on the blog of Prairiewoods Franciscan Spirituality Center, Hiawatha, Iowa. http://prairiewoods.org/bouquet-of-thorns/Thanks to people like you, Marianne’s 💥 Substack is a reader-supported publication! Get full access to Marianne’s Substack at marianneabellipschutz.substack.com/subscribe