Early last month, at the beginning of Summer's end, I found myself still soaking up the warm rays of Sun, at my favorite spot in Boulder Canyon, until I was sufficiently hot and ready to be refreshed by the cool, clear waters of the creek. I immersed myself with a plunge, the excess warmth instantly sucked from my skin, my nerves alight with the frigid sensation. Relaxing, I connected more deeply with the water and let myself notice how its current swirled around me, flowing ever onward.
Closing my eyes for some time enjoying this solitude, I was a little bit startled to feel a slight bump on my right side. When I looked at the source of what caused the bump, I was further surprised to see before me a perfect, red apple.
“Had someone lost their lunch?” I wondered, looking upstream, half expecting to see a distressed picknicker. When I did not see a person, yet across the creek’s bank I saw four more apples washed up on shore, the realization swept through me that this was not a human-to-human interaction. Nature itself was speaking to me. For of all the places this apple could have floated, it floated right to me, fallen from its mother tree further upstream.
For weeks, I’d been practicing Subagh Kriya and Gyan Chakra Kriya with the intention to receive prosperity in whatever form God willed. And here I was, filling up with the gratitude for God’s love as I beheld this exquisite gift. At home it has been a time of financial pressure with both me and my partner between jobs, and there was every temptation to fixate and contract around the monetary aspect of what we might call “prosperity”. But yet here was an apple that even still brings tears to my eyes as I think about it, whose value will always be priceless, and whose image will continue to live on deep in my heart.
Savoring its perfection, I held it; inhaling its sweetness and let the depths of its reds, yellows, and greens saturate my mind. Somewhere in me, a knowingness emerged that this gift was not meant to be appreciated solely as an external object, but deeply received into my very being–– a sacrament sent from the heart of Creation.
Adonai, sifatai tiftach ooveed yagid taheelatecha. “Eternal God, open my lips that my mouth may declare Thy Glory”. This is the prayer recited by Jews before they open the ark that holds their sacred scriptures. And as I opened my lips in that moment to receive the flesh of Nature’s living body into my mouth, my very being entered into worship of the Mother; my mind flooded with love, and my taste buds flooded with sweetness. What could be more prosperous than joy such as this?
Reflecting on this moment after the fact, I recalled this lesson from Jesus to the people:
“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life…. Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them…. Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life? So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink? … Your Heavenly Father knows that you need them…. But seek first His kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.” Matthew 6:25-34
Under pressuring financial circumstances, it can be difficult for anyone to trust that life is truly unfolding “in the highest”, or that God is truly providing. But for me, this moment helped.
Thank you for reading my story.
With Love,
Jacob
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