A Promising Future

Arise, my love, my fair one, and come away. (Song of Solomon 2: 13)

Grace and peace to you this Saturday afternoon. We are now squarely in the throes of mid-summer. While the heat and humidity are up a few notches, so are the beautiful blossoming flowers. I pray that you are able to greet these summer days as the gifts that they are. Know you are alway in my prayers.

Tomorrow we will celebrate Brook’s last day with us as Associate Rector at St. Peter’s and send him on his way to Christ Church, Mount Pleasant in South Carolina. One of the options for the response to the reading tomorrow is a passage from the Song of Solomon. Brooks has requested this passage, a text that otherwise does not appear in our lectionary. 

The Song of Solomon is a love song that recalls God’s love for Israel. Christians also interpret the Song as an allegory for Christ’s love for the Church. Either way, the poetry speaks of a mutual love marked by joy and a new and flourishing life. In the passage we will hear tomorrow, the speaker calls his beloved to a new time on the horizon, one marked by beautiful sights, sounds, and scents. A place and time of celebration.

Indeed, tomorrow we will celebrate, and bid farewell to Brooks. The grief that comes with saying good-bye is borne out of love and of the good fruit of the relationships forged over the past two and a half years. 

The passage from the Song of Solomon reminds us that God is working in all our lives, calling us all to a thriving and flourishing future. Just as God called Israel to its bright future, let us beckon Brooks and one another to the promising future that awaits us all: 

Now the winter is past,
the rain is over and gone.

The flowers appear on the earth;
the time of singing has come,

and the voice of the turtledove
is heard in our land.

The fig tree puts forth its figs,
and the vines are in blossom;
they give forth fragrance.

Brooks will not be far away and I am certain that the people of Christ Church in Mount Pleasant, SC will greet visitors from St. Peter’s at any time. In the meantime, let’s celebrate with Brooks!

See you tomorrow.

The Rev. Jenifer Gamber, Rector
St. Peter's Episcopal Church