"Straight, Daddy?"

I was walking and talking with God by the river tonight, watching and listening to the Canadian geese, thinking all over again about how they can lift off out of the St. Joseph's River and fly confidently to a place in the South where they've possibly never been before.

I leaned against the side of the wooden bridge, overcome by God's presence, by his reassurance that he is that, and so much more, to us.  We will know.  We will lift off in faith, unafraid when he calls, whether to heaven (that thing we call death) or just to step back out into the hallway at work, and face something we are sure we cannot face.

As I hurried to get home before it was too much darker, a little boy ran past me.  I had heard him earlier, calling to his family.  He got to the end of our bridge, where the path divides, and stopped, and hollered, "Straight, Daddy?"

I didn't hear his father's answer, but the boy stopped and waited.  God is like that too.  He knows the best way home.  He have only to ask, and wait for his instructions. 

He will always, always answer.

We are safer than the Canadian goose in the sky, safer than the boy in his father's arms.