Bee Still

A few days ago I was at work and I got an email that really frustrated me.  It was a personal matter, not work related, but it was an unexpected and it left me with a feeling that I wanted to cut and run.  I was going to work through lunch but my concentration was shot and my office was freezing so I took a walk.   I needed to feel the warmth of the sun, and since the Mississippi humidity hasn’t hit yet the noon sun was bearable and a welcomed relief.

At first I was going to sit in my building’s outdoor eating area but then I remembered the Medicine Wheel Garden built by the campus Inter-tribal Society so I decided to take a stroll through it to see what was blooming.  The garden was built in 2007 and for a long time it was mostly weeds with a few plants here and there.  A couple of years ago one of the campus organizations went in and cleaned it nicely but it has overgrown again with bushes and trees taller than me.  I liked walking through it even though it was a little unsettling not being able to see around the corner to the next quadrant.  I came out and sat on a log bench and looked into the garden with my back to the parking lot.  There in my solitude I thawed in the sun and cooled my mood.

As I sat and thought and prayed I heard a familiar sound.  It was the zzzt zzzt zzzt of a bee.  I looked around and noticed the blooming Smooth Sumac tree I was sitting near was swarming with bees.  These bees were not the friendly looking bumblebee like the one on the cereal box, nor were they the beneficial honey bees that are disappearing at an alarming rate.  These bees wore slick black armor and carried yellow backpacks with a black dot in the middle.  These were carpenter bees.  I really don’t care for carpenter bees.  They are destructive and arrogant.  They’ll hover at eye level and stare you down.  Thankfully these bees were so enrapt with their feast they did not notice me.

I know some people who will flee at the mere thought of a bee near them, but bees do not bother me.  I leave them alone and they leave me alone.  Now, don’t get me wrong. I’m not about to don a beekeeper’s suit and delve into a hive for honey, but I did feel an air of confidence sitting there with bees all around me.  They kept me still and their droning was like a monk’s chant, calming and meditative.  

It’s always easiest for me to spend quality time with God when I am surrounded by his creations with the sounds of nature as my only distraction. As the hour melted away in the warmth of the sun, so did my worries and frustration lift away on bees’ wings all the way to God’s shoulders. 

Psa 46:10  Be still, and know that I am God: I will be exalted among the heathen, I will be exalted in the earth.