“The God within is like a homing device placed within us, like those found naturally in homing pigeons. No matter where they’re released, they know how to find their way back home… We can think of the Holy Spirit as our interior homing device … No matter how lost we get, it keeps pointing us back ‘home’—to love, to connection, to meaningful relationship…” -Richard Rohr

Welcome to Day 35 of the Wonders of Worship (WOW) series. Today we ponder the Sending.

I got lost (in the best of ways) researching homing pigeons and migratory birds. Here’s a fascinating listen about how the mystery of bird navigation might find an answer in quantum entanglement. The part about migrating birds starts at 8:00 and goes until 34:30.

“Our world, and the worlds around and within it, is aflame with shades of brilliance we cannot fathom.” -Sy Montgomery

To download the black and white image for personal use: on a computer, click and drag the image to your desktop; on a phone, press on the picture until it gives you the option to save it to your photos. The image is formatted to fit on an 8.5″x11″ piece of paper, but feel free to print it whatever size you’d like.

Background: I created a series of forty 5″x7″ watercolor paintings inspired by the elements of worship. It was work commissioned by a project with Nourishing Vocation with Children at St. Olaf College, a program funded through Lilly Endowment’s Nurturing Children Through Worship and Prayer Initiative.

As the paintings are shared, you may notice a pattern:

• Music = Songbird
• Prayer = Seed and/or Fruit
• Word = Leaf
• Order of Service = Element of Nature
• Season = Insect with a Flower

One final creative invitation for this project remains for me: to paint a Tree of Life holding all forty elements. I plan to share its progress here.

For this series, I am grateful to have used handmade paper from White Dragon Paper and watercolor paints from Natural Earth Paint.