It is early morning and I am sitting in a quiet little room at Christ the King Retreat Center near Buffalo, Minnesota. I am here for the yearly retreat in which I am privileged to meet and hear the stories of those coming to be ordained as ministers in the United Methodist Church. It is always a time I look forward to, not only for the opportunity to be present to these people on their journeys but also to be in this place set apart for quiet, reflection and connecting with the Holy. As I write this a deep fog is hanging over the frozen lake outside my window. The leafless trees are standing watch over the tiny houses owned by people who are more courageous than I, people who have not heeded the warnings that our winter has been too warm for such activities as ice fishing, ice houses and driving on the lakes. In the dense fog, I can just make out one house and a truck that has pulled up to it. This scene defies wisdom for me but then I am not originally ‘from around here’ and perhaps don’t understand this lake the way the driver does.

Yesterday on the drive here, I had another experience that baffled me in another way. Tooling along Highway 55, I was minding my own business not thinking about much of anything, when two large white birds flew over the highway right in the path of my car. Flying in tandem, these enormous, beautiful birds stretched their long necks toward their destination. Snow geese. I quickly turned my head to see if there were more where they came from, thinking it odd that they were flying as a duo instead of in a flock. Instead of seeing more white flying wings, I saw a large tree with the primeval stick nest of an eagle. Sitting, watching the snow geese just as I had, was a mature white headed eagle. The two of us had been offered the gift of these soaring birds of winter. As some of my more conservative Christian friends say, I felt ‘twice blessed’.

Just last week I had had a conversation with someone about flying, about how she often sees the presence of the Sacred One in those that rise above the earth. This person talked of the many ways she had seen both the immanence and transcendence of God in flying creatures both large and small. We both shared the times when we had slept and then dreamed of flying, how it felt, the freedom of it, the sense of soaring above all we could see. Certainly there are scriptures that talk of the power and prominence of eagles, some even liken the movement of the Spirit to those with wings. As far as I know there is no reference snow geese in the scriptures. But I could be wrong.

All I know is that on this one particular day, I was lifted above the ordinary by a soaring I will never be able to attain on my power.  A soaring that is not available to me with my two legs. A soaring that must feel like a freedom I have never known. A soaring that would allow me to grasp a perspective I do not have in my groundedness. Being caught off guard by these three beautiful birds seemed a wake up call. While two flew and one surveyed the earth from a high perch, I continued on my way blessed by their presence. It felt like a holy moment in an otherwise ordinary day.

This morning as I reflected on this experience that felt like sacred gift, I was reminded of a poem by (surprise!) Mary Oliver in which she describes an experience of snow geese. She ends the poem with these words: “ The geese flew on, I may never see them again. Maybe I will, someday, somewhere. Maybe I won’t. It doesn’t matter. What matters is that, when I saw them, I saw them as through the veil, secretly, joyfully, clearly.”

And to that I say ‘amen’. My encounter with snow geese at 55 miles an hour on a highway in the less than beautiful days of February was a gift that allowed me to glimpse both the nearness and the soaring nature of both bird and Creator. I don’t understand this encounter anymore than I do driving a car on a frozen lake. But as I joined my fellow earth traveler, the eagle, in observing their flight, I would like to think that we both shared in the experience secretly, joyfully and clearly.