Peonies and a Prayer

Aromatic Creator God,

I smell Your glory in the just-plowed earth awaiting spring planting.

I smell your glory in the air after the rain.

I smell Your glory in bruised mint leaves being prepared for tea.

I smell Your glory on my fingertips after cleaning strawberries for my family to eat.

Your glory prevades the air in fragrant blooms of hyacinth, lilac, and rose,

in freshly baked bread and Sunday-dinner roast,

in the fishy smell of the pier and the musky smell of the barnyard,

in the sweet bury-your-nose-in-it scent of a newborn babe.

For the [fragrance] of Your glory and the sense of smell,

I give you thanks.

-Donna Mast, An aromatic prayer of thanks (from the Simply in Season Cookbook)

I find God's glory in the scent of peonies picked from the bush of a vacant house, the coffee brewing first thing in the morning, the smell of freshly cut grass, the faint smell of dew on a morning run (the first in a very, very long time), the smell of my babies after a bath, dirt, honeysuckle, tea, the forest. Fresh, fragrant, tantalizing Spring. I hope you have a chance to stop and smell God's glory this week.