I did not take photos. It seemed out of place to me.

But i did walk up to the top of my hill, watched the sun rise over the eastward mountains. Then, i turned around and looked out to the Pacific horizon. The sea was a dark gray. The rising sun infused the sky with a blue that would become intense azure. The white and thinly gray wisps of marine layer clouds would vanish soon.

It was cool.

i considered what the Pacific meant, and what it might have meant to Magellan as he crossed it hundreds of years ago. Peace hung in the air around me as i paused and bowed my head.

Memories flooded my thoughts. Lebanon, Tennessee. 1950s, probably actually 1950, because i was six in my memory. If so, it was April 9th. The pastors of many of the city’s churches stood on the steps of the now gone McFadden Auditorium. The metal chairs, i remember them as white, were neatly aligned in rows on the grass. The sun shone brightly. It was 7:00 a.m. CST, not sunrise. Yet it was still cold. My mother was dressed in her finest pink suit with a pillbox hat, much like the other women there. My father was in a suit and tie, hatless, also like the other men filling the seats. i was in my easter suit, i remember seersucker, with shorts, white socks and white shoes. The shorts are strikingly clear in my mind because my exposed thighs felt as if they were frozen onto the cold metal of the chair’s seat.

Above all, i remember feeling his presence, this guy who was born a half-century shy of two thousand years before. Peace. Yes, peace was there, more felt than the sermons, the prayers, or the hymns in that small city, seventy-six years ago. It did not matter my mother was pinching my bottom in a effort to stop wriggling atop the cold of the chair. i felt his presence there.

It was there this morning. Peace.

i shall not go into religion, quote the bible, or wonderful words of great philosophers. My brother Joe is the man for that, and if you haven’t read some his stuff, you should. He can move you.

i’ll just note that amidst the rantings of war and money and hate and fear, i stood on that hill this morning with the rising sun at my back, looked out over the Pacific and felt peace as it should be. It matters not, i think, what you believe in your religion or denial of religion. If you pause, you can feel him. You can feel peace.

Thank you, Jesus.