God Takes The Long View
by Donavon L Riley
The revival of faith may seem distant for those in quiet, thinning parishes, but God plows where He wills, calling us to sow faithfully in hope, trusting the slow work of His harvest. — D.
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We live in days where roots stretch thin beneath the soil. The church pews that once groaned under the weight of young families now sit hushed and hollow. It strikes like a prairie wind, this quiet. Those we prayed beside in our youth have wandered far, and the faces that gather now are etched with years. We hear it said, even so, that the old ways stir again—that cathedrals in the cities swell with veiled women and many-childrened clans. But in smaller places, in the outlands, the fields lie fallow still. It is hard to reconcile the hopeful buzz of “tradition reborn” with the silence so many still walk through.
The world that shapes these things is full of edges, unseen but sharp. On the one hand, there’s the ache of a parish that seems to shrink with each passing year. On the other, the glow of an online hearth where faith is fierce and words become wildfires. Yet these are not the same world, and the gulf between them can bring both sorrow and weariness. One wonders: Is the flowering of tradition a city feast, drawn to crowded streets and the cloistered thoughts of thinkers? For many, it feels like standing on the outer hills, looking in.
Perhaps the fault lies with expectation—how the mind longs for a revival wrought as clean as new cloth, unmarred by difference or drift. But God does not plow in straight lines. He breaks the ground how He wills. Where one sees veils and the rise of chants in cities, another sees a hard path walked alone, sowing the seeds of a faith that might take root yet. The church grows not where we demand it but where the soil proves good.
The work for those who wait is simple and hard all at once: remain faithful. Banish from the heart both despair and that creeping urge to measure worth by numbers. No field blooms overnight. Instead, look to the frost-slicked earth, the rain-blackened branches of the shelterbelt, the bright caw of the crow above. What looks empty now is often a sleeping promise. God takes the long view, and we are called to walk it with Him, sowing where we can, trusting the harvest unseen.