The chilly air of a Scottish April morning warmed slightly as the sun rose slowly. Or at least, became present in unseen places. It doesn’t shine too intensely in Scotland on a regular basis.
Nonetheless, as the dewy ground heated slightly it gave way to a gentle mist, the dawning light catching the edges thereof, creating in it a soft, pink hue. Up ahead, a slender fox disappeared over a fence into someone’s back garden, and a few small robins and finches darted between the hedgerows. The animals and Iwere the only ones out that early in the morning, all of us going about our routine in silence.
Heading for my usual morning walk around a local lake, my feet followed a measured cadence. They were in autopilot mode while my brain was preoccupied with deep existential matters. Here I was, heading toward the end of my Bible college course, and struggling with the unexpected deep trenches of the darkness of doubt. Wrestling with the problems of evil, God’s existence, the nature of humanity and all sorts of other things, not sure whether my prayers were even reaching beyond the misty ceiling that enveloped me, nonetheless, I clung on. I had ventured outside of the Bible College campus that morning with a longing that would not let me go through that entire dark year of my life. I had left the confines of libraries and classrooms to walk, to think, to wrestle, to be confounded, to muddle my way through to clarity. I would apply all my faculties of reasoning, because I was desperate. I had headed for the lake, feeling abandoned, yet with the intent of meeting the Maker.
Daily, I would walk around the lake. Often the sun caught it brilliantly before I headed back, creating a shimmering sea upon which the local swans delicately glided. Of course, their legs were busy moving under the surface. Much like my heart. Hands shoved deep in my jacket pockets, shoulders hunched forward, tensing my muscles to prevent the cold from seeping in, I walked as silent as the foxes and swans, but silence is not always best.
As my confused mind darted between ideas and concepts, all of a sudden the silence was broken. It was the first sound that I became aware of that cold morning. It was a pigeon, cooing softly.
I never thought very highly of pigeons. Often pestered by city pigeons with mangled legs in bus stations, or the like. Like most people, I thought them a bit of a pest. But this lone companion of mine near a small Scottish lake, completely disarmed me. The sound of that coo broke through my frenzied reasoning, it pulled me out of my self-voiced echo-chamber and pierced into the deepest recesses of my mind.
In a flash, a feeling of nostalgia swept over me. That coo suddenly inserted itself in a chorus of such pigeonly voices from a multitude of times in my life. It brought back memories of travelling to the USA and Canada with my father and hearing the pigeons in the forest. It showed me a picture of sunshine breaking through a window in the Netherlands, awaking to the sound of a friendly pigeon outside my window. It transported me back to my beloved France, resting in the garden of the campsite where I worked, listening to the pigeons as the spoke to one another in the heat of the day mixed with a gentle Alpine breeze. I witnessed again a pigeon take a valiant stand against some crows outside my guesthouse room in Southern India. I can’t say that I had noted these moments pointedly at the time, but now, all of a sudden, I was there again, revisiting all these places across the world. And with me the whole time? The pigeons.
A wave of weakness swept over me. A defence barrier had been broken through. A Coo d’Etat had happened in the kingdom of my soul. I felt my frailty, my inability to sort myself out, a sense of loneliness in my struggle, and abandonment by the God I had loved and served. But I was aware of the presence of these pigeons at every juncture of my life, on every continent I had ever trod. And somehow, as I went to meet the Maker, he came and met me. Maybe not Saul on the road to Damascus with a bright light from heaven, but Dónal on the way to the lake was nonetheless arrested and cast down by a realisation of the presence of God, through the voice of a pigeon.
That singular coo led to a flashback; the flashback led to something clicking in my mind in that instant. In those faithful birds, I was forced to recall their ever-present companionship. And somehow it awoke me to the reality of God’s hesed, his “steadfast love” or “covenant faithfulness”. I had travelled the globe. I had done many things, met many people, walked many paths. In all that time, I had not always noticed God’s presence. I had not always considered his great faithfulness and love. But nonetheless it was there as my ever-present constant companion. I could not outpace it. I could not ignore it into oblivion. I could not out-crises the hesed of God. Not in an active experience of it, nor in a passive living under it. My dust-formed mind was strong enough to throw me for a loop, but it was not strong enough to change the presence of God’s hesed.
The Spirit chooses the oddest ways to speak to us sometimes. And anecdotally, it’s often not through the front-door of our hearts. Nor even the backdoor that we keep well-guarded. He makes his way in the bathroom window, down the chimney, up a drainpipe. He comes in wherever we are least prepared, and disarms us with his characteristic gentleness. He takes the truths that we have stored in our hearts, and pulls them out of storage, presenting them to us afresh, breaking down our walls, and as we weep for the weight of our resistance falling down, he comforts us in every way.
I love pigeons now. Every time I see one, or hear their beautiful coo, I am drawn to praise for the ever-present nature of God’s hesed. It’s a running joke with my sister and her husband, and I often receive pictures of pigeons from places they are visiting. (And I was very proud of my niece for trying to talk with pigeons for 30 minutes last week… she is not even 2 years old though…). The society in which we now live see pigeons as a blessing of prosperity. “A dwindling pigeon population is considered a portend of ill fortune,” according to one writer. While I am certainly not leaning towards folk Islamic practices, I personally must (tongue-in cheek) agree. To live without their coo, is unthinkable for me. I am glad they are so prolific, for so it is with my heavenly Father’s faithful and steadfast love. And I need the reminder of that on a daily basis.
Imitators of Those 
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