Do you know that famous inspirational verse “Footprints in the Sand,” in which the narrator finds that at the most troubling times in life, while walking with God, there is only one set of footprints?  Do you remember how the narrator discovers that the one set of footprints belongs to God, since God has carried that person through the most difficult times in life?

If God leaves visible marks on our lives to remind us of God’s presence, then those marks are “Mystery” and “Unity.”  Whenever I notice them in life, I know God has been present and working.  Like the old sign, “X was here,” I know God’s been here.

Some poignant examples of this from my own life were the unexpected birth of my youngest brother, John, and also of my youngest nephew, Benny, whose eighth birthday is today.

In the case of John’s birth, he was my parents’ late-in-life “surprise,” coming along ten years after the last baby, me.  I had prayed every night for this miracle.  My six older siblings and I, along with my more-than-middle-age parents, were overwhelmed with surprise on a certain Valentine’s Day.  Upon her return from the hospital with what we thought was a routine gall bladder attack, Mom stood in the doorway, looked straight at me and said, “Well, it looks like WE’RE GOING TO HAVE A BABY!” 

Mystery?  You bet.  The look of total amazement never left my Dad’s face.  Unity?  Absolutely.  I never knew a time of such joy and hope and togetherness in my family.  My brother, John, will always be a sacrament to me.

In the case of my nephew, Benny, his birth was also a sure sign of the presence of God in our lives.  Benny’s older brother, Christopher, had died at four months of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome, an event that stunned and devastated our family.  Ben’s birth was God’s way of bringing new life into our midst after a time of darkness that seemed unbearable.  Just last month, Ben made his First Holy Communion, and I know he represents God’s continued “Yes” to new life.

Mystery?  The inexplicable loss we experience in death and the breathtaking miracle of new life are interconnected, and inseparable.  Unity?  In life or in death, we belong to God, and God takes us all together, as a unit, in the wholeness of our being, and in the community of humanity.  We are created in God’s image not as solitary beings, but as people in community. 

Humanity was created in the divine image as male and female, together, as a unit.  Since it is God’s own nature to be a loving unity of Three-in-One, we most reflect God when we are a loving community.  It is not good for us to be alone, nor to be unloved and unloving, isolated and alienated.

Today’s reading from Tobit shows those two marks of the presence of God.  Two young people, brought together in love, out of a context of darkness and death, were united as husband and wife not out of selfishness, but “for a noble purpose,” as Tobiah prayed.  “It is not good for the man to be alone,” he remembered.  And behold!  After so much death (Sarah had lost seven husbands on their wedding nights!), God worked mysteriously (with an archangel in disguise and the liver and heart of a raw fish!) to bring about new life, not just for Tobiah and Sarah, but for their parents as well!  Mystery and unity; God was there.

Jesus was the surest sign of God’s presence in the world, bringing the most unlikely people together in a holy community.  Unity!  For Jesus, the first command to love God is accomplished by observing the command to love our neighbor.  Jesus was able to do both perfectly.  Mystery!  Jesus ranked love as first, above sacrifice, so that even His death on the cross, without love, would not have been perfect.  As I look at the cross, I can see the marks of mystery and unity, and I know that “God’s been here.” 

O loving God, we praise You for Your holy Presence!  Help us to see You in our lives today!  Amen.