Like a Dove - July 9
Today’s Readings: AM Psalm 16, 17; PM Psalm 22; 1 Samuel 17:17-30; Acts 10:34-48; Mark 1:1-13
Today’s Reflection
“In those days Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan. And just as he was coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending like a dove on him. And a voice came from heaven, ‘You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.’” –Mark 1: 9-11
I’ve always found birds both comforting and fascinating. Their songs bring me a sense of joy and peace. Their fluttering and gliding about the yard, eating seeds, finding worms, splashing around in water, reminds me always of the ways God provides for even the birds of the air. Birds’ interactions with one another often remind me by analogy of the ways in which we people can interact with one another—there’s enough seed for everyone, and different kinds of birds can all come and find sustenance together around the same feeder. In my childhood home, one of my bedroom windows looked out onto a small patio, from which hanging pots hung down from the eaves. I still remember the mother dove who once decided to make a nest for her eggs in one of these potted plants, just outside my window, and I recall watching with expectation for when the dove eggs would hatch.
So, it’s not surprising that, when I made my first visit to the Seminary of the Southwest in Austin back in February 2016, I noticed the doves. Maybe birds are not what everyone notices when they visit a seminary campus, but the doves’ presence there was very striking to me. The seminary campus is quite small, a cloister of two-story, limestone-covered buildings gathered roughly in a circle facing inward toward an open area called the Motte (which, as our seminary dean shared with us is a term, specific to the Southwest, for a grove of trees). The trees in the Motte are all oak trees, many of which are beautiful old live oak trees that have been there since the Rather House (now the seminary administration building) was a family home in the old days of Austin.
In the quiet of that first evening at the seminary, and again in other quiet moments on that campus visit, I noticed the sounds of doves calling in these oak trees. The acoustics of the stone buildings arranged around the Motte amplified their calls. As one who was there as part of an intense period of discernment, and as one who has long looked for and listened for God in nature, I found a sense of God’s peace and holiness in the sounds of those doves. It felt like confirmation, in a way, that this would be a peaceful and holy place to be formed for ministry. Later, when my family moved there for seminary, we put out a feeder to attract these same doves to the little tree that shaded our front porch. And as I went about my seminary life those three years, I always stopped to listen when I heard the doves continue to call out to one another—and, maybe, also to me.
In our Judeo-Christian heritage, doves have long played an important role in the relationship between God and people. When the earth flooded and Noah took his family and the animals into the ark, he sent a dove out to see if it would return; when the dove returned with a sprig of olive leaves in its beak, Noah saw it as a sign that the waters were receding. In the Song of Solomon, doves are used in this love poem as a way of describing the beauty of the beloved. Throughout the Scriptures, doves are frequently mentioned as the sacrifice that people of meager means, like Joseph and Mary, could afford to bring to the temple.
And so, when we read in Mark’s Gospel that at the baptism of Jesus the Holy Spirit descended on Jesus “like a dove,” we are not surprised to read of the Spirit being described in this way. If you’ve ever watched doves, you know that they flutter their wings in a particular way as they hover down to a landing. This seems to be what Mark was getting at when he uses the image of the dove to describe the Holy Spirit descending on Jesus as he rose forth from the waters of the Jordan.
Over this past year of living in Birmingham, I’ve enjoyed all the birds who call our big backyard beneath the pecan and oak trees home. Rarely (if ever), have I noticed doves amongst the cardinals and thrashers and blue birds and the rest. But lately, just these past few weeks, a pair of doves has started to appear, and call me mystical or out there, but when I see them I do feel a sense of peace and reassurance—a sense that God’s Spirit is in our midst, and has been all along.
—Becky+
Questions for Self-Reflection
What reminds you of the presence of the Holy Spirit at work in your life and in the world around you? A gentle breeze? A gusty wind? A cleansing rain? The waves of the ocean? The flickering of a candle’s flame? A roaring fire? The sounds of doves? The voice of a friend?
Daily Challenge
See and read about one visual representation of Christ’s baptism in the Visual Commentary on Scripture. You can also use the search feature on this web site to explore how other artists have used doves in visual interpretations of scripture over the centuries.