Walking on a clear spring day under an eternal blue sky is almost forgettable until the glad surprise of a hawk’s shadow passes over. Suddenly, we are startled to attention. Hawks are a sign of the spirit’s presence since the fifth day of creation. Hawks call us to attention and stop us in our tracks. They invite our gaze into the heavens as they watch over us like a mother. They offer the strength to believe that all manner of things shall be well. Hawks have flown close to me since my mother’s death thirty years ago. I have preached about the time one swooped down and brought me to my knees.
Hawks symbolize focus and spiritual ascension. They are an example of God's intricate creation as God asks Job, “Does the hawk take flight by your wisdom, and spread its wings toward the south?" Hawks are noted for vigilance. I remember the day one sat on the fence outside the Tennessee Prison for Women and I felt that fleeting peace that passes understanding.
The grace of their flight is singular in thermal pockets that send them soaring while keeping their eye on earth for signs of life. They call to mind earthly concerns while rising towards the heavens. Hawks offer seekers who are willing to stop, clarity and communication with the divine.
To watch you like a hawk is about unwavering devotion. Hawks have visual acuity roughly eight times greater than humans. They can spot a mouse a mile away with their extreme magnification and high resolution.
This year, we are celebrating the hawk, too often labeled simply as an aggressor. In truth it only hunts to survive, while watching the world like a good contemplative practitioner. The Center for Contemplative Justice , where I serve as chair, has adopted the hawk as its symbol. Fun fact—female hawks grow 25% bigger than males, the largest difference in the animal kingdom. It is a good and right thing to symbolize a contemplative justice mission with a fierce matriarchal hunter of life.
For thirty-three years, as long as Jesus lived, I have made my walk from my house to Easter services while it is still dark. Those walks to St. Augustine's Chapel on Vanderbilt's campus - have been laced with every feeling under the sun, including grief, joy, exhaustion, fear, excitement, wonder, and anger. As the world turns and life unfolds, through birth and death, my adoration of the Red-tailed, Red-shouldered, and Cooper’s Hawks that live there and alight on the chapel's spire, has been a constant. Always my spirit is awakened and new dreams are born.
I once saw a trinity of hawks over the chapel just as we were a new not-for-profit, The Center for Contemplative Justice. We were birthing the CCJ to help expand and protect the justice ministries that felt at risk during this precarious time in the life of the chapel after. The three hawks watching over us was a blessing that the spirit was with us. More than twenty years later that organization serves thousands and thousands of people across our world.
I imagine Magdalene was searching for signs of life as she began her journey, while it was still dark, with grief as her guide. Rev. Charlie Strobel used to preach, look for a sign and keep going—a flickering candle, a flower on the path, or God-willing, a celestial hawk cutting through dawn's early light. Such a glad surprise would allow her to walk beyond despair, push aside darkness, and move towards a tomb where the rock that has rolled reveals new life.
The cry of a hawk is a glimmer of hope in darkness. That glimmer is enough for all those grieving under the same blue sky in this big old world. It is enough to bring a glad surprise where our Lord lingers for us and reminds us that love is the only thing that will never die. It is enough for us to keep on our path and proclaim, "He is risen!" and "Love rises from the ashes.”
We find our way as dawn comes around the bend and we watch for signs and follow love’s path. Witnessing the hawk’s striped tail and—white underbelly catching sunlight, and circling hope, is just one of the signs of God’s love for those with ears to hear and eyes to see.
Look for a sign and keep going. This doesn’t mean death has lost its sting, or that it isn't scary to head out in the darkness. It doesn't mean we aren’t afraid of what's happening around us. It means we understand that we are going to keep walking together towards something beautiful.
Hawks are bearers of “a glad surprise” to wandering pilgrims. Howard Thurman, the great justice mystic who was the grandfather of the civil rights movement wrote that a glad surprise is spring after a hard season. I believe Easter is our glad surprise after a long lent.
Howard Thurman believed these moments carried elation along with something holier than the surprise itself. The glad surprise is the ground of hope within the nature of life. These experiences come at the end of a long tunnel of tragedy or tribulation we have passed through. I love imagining the surprise Magdalene experienced after stumbling in the darkness making her way towards the military men guarding the tomb—suddenly to discover signs of life that lead her into light.
Thurman says, “A glad surprise is the announcement that life cannot ultimately be conquered by death, that there is no road that is at last swallowed up in an ultimate darkness, that there is strength added when the labors increase… So we can take courage...
When we have exhausted our store of endurance,
When our strength has failed ere the day is half done,
When we reach the end of our hoarded resources,
Our Father’s full giving is only begun.”
The glad surprise sweeps over us like a hawk in flight. It is the faith that those who we love, the beloved of us, live on in the memory of God. Like Magdalene, we are surprised that the tomb is empty! Love travels with us as closely as a hawk watches over us in times of trouble. Keep looking towards the heavens for a glad surprise of love. Those signs are enough for us to take a few more shaky steps and trust that we can make our song on our own Easter morning.
Alleluia. Alleluia, Alleluia.
-- Becca Stevens
