The desert sands are the dry tears of the earth, the deep tears too precious to share, the pain beyond expression. Yet, there is beauty and life in that most desperate climate and ecology. The plants that grow there are all the more precious because of the rarity and hardship in their life requirement. How beautiful must be the fruit birthed in the suffering of a person that arrives in the climate of their utmost pain.

Compassion often arrives to a suffering soul through the life of one who has likewise suffered. It is the offered arm of one who, without judgment, wants to lift up and strengthen his fellow. It is the warriors bond of, “We can stand as we support each other and continue the fight.” It is a love that goes over, under, or around the walls of judgement that separates people from each other. It is the care that sacrifices itself for the genuine need of the other. It is the quality that marks the work and/or presence of God in us by not having ourselves as its center or key component. It is a beauty beyond most or all others despite its circumstance. It is the desert flower both vulnerable and enduring, strength bonded to weakness. It is the quality that the story tellers hunt for in the history of people and their survival in the tumult of life.

I would that I could be an oasis for others who travel the desert places I sometimes inhabit. I would hope to provide a drink of water during a time of their dryness and a place of shade for rest in the heat of the journey. I hope that my time in the desert would provide a respite for them as has been provided for me by those who put themselves aside for my benefit and need. The Israelites wandered in tents, from well to well or water source to water source, through the dry and sometimes harsh environments of their trail. A perfect image of our wandering process of growth development through the often inhospitable circumstances of this temporary world. Yet, like the desert, we have opportunities to see and taste the beauty of that which is to come when the deserts are no more.