Consider the Dewberry

By Julie Lavender

My quarantine walk with God looks different than pre-Covid walks. With less traffic on some of the roads surrounding my neighborhood, I’ve taken a different path. But, the coronavirus has led most of us on different paths, right?

CONSIDER THE HONEYSUCKLE
By Julie Lavender

I’ve taken a different path during my morning walks with God recently. The bigger road that leads to our neighborhood is less-traveled with many working from home, so I often walk that road now, as it eventually leads to a cow pasture. With social distancing, it seems that I’ve taken to chatting with the bovines.

Consider the Fringe Tree
By Julie Lavender

My walks look different these days, but God’s beauty still abounds. My husband and I passed a white fringe tree on our walk this morning. The fleecy white, barely fragrant flowers hang from the branches and flutter to and fro when the winds stir.

Consider the Mountains
By Julie Lavender

Nothing proclaims God's majesty to me quite like a view of the mountains. The mountains seem to proclaim God's might. To fashion such a monstrous, solid, fortifying mass of earth shows his power and majesty. 

Though I can't take a walk to the mountains in my current confinement, I can visualize them from my south Georgia home and remember past walks with God there. 

Consider the Dandelion
By Julie Lavender

On my walk with God with morning, dandelion puffballs dotted my path. Remember blowing the seeds and making a wish? 

CONSIDER THE BLISTER BEETLE
by Julie Lavender

On my walk with God this week, I was captivated by some of the brave flowers that had burst forth, despite the fact that more cold weather was on the way. Taking a closer look at the early blooms, I also spotted a couple of blister beetles making their way about the foliage.

I quickly steered clear and kept walking. 

CONSIDER THE STELLER'S JAY

by Julie Lavender

On our trip out west, my husband and I also encountered Steller’s jay birds on the same walk where we spotted magpies. 

Large songbirds, the Steller’s jay is a gorgeous shade of blue with a charcoal black head. Steller’s jays and blue jays are the only North American jays with crests atop their heads.

CONSIDER THE MAGPIE
by Julie Lavender

On a walk in the Rocky Mountain National Park, my husband and I spotted beautiful, winged magpies. With none of these gorgeous beauties in my neck of the woods in south Georgia, they especially attracted my attention.

Consider the Waterfall
by Julie Lavender

   I 

      love 

         waterfalls. 

CONSIDER THE ARMADILLO
by Julie Lavender

My family took an afternoon walk the day after Thanksgiving in a nearby state park. The weather was beautiful here in south-Georgia, and I was on a quest to take pictures of autumn shades before the leaves completely let go for the season.

CONSIDER THE SWEETGUM TREE
by Julie Lavender

I’ve watched for weeks as many of my Facebook friends have bragged and boasted, gloated and crowed. Words and pictures piqued my jealousy. It’s just not fair. Everybody else has them …. why can’t I enjoy the splendor, too?

CONSIDER THE ZEBRA LONGWING BUTTERLY

by Julie Lavender

I always forget they’re still here this time of year. 

Strikingly beautiful with their black bodies and black wings and impressive, light-yellow zebra-like stripes stretching across each wing, Zebra longwing butterflies glide about the lantana flowers in the front yard.

CONSIDER THE MAYFLY

Its name is a misnomer. The diminutive insect is active more often than just the month of May. My husband and I spotted a plethora of those dainty mayflies flitting about while we were walking on an Indian summer day.

“Look quickly – they only live a day,” said my biologist husband. “Sometimes two days, at most.”

Mayflies, in the order Ephemeroptera, have one job as an adult: to mate and produce eggs to start the cycle all over again. The female lays the eggs on top of the water. As the eggs fall to the bottom of the water, the female quickly becomes fish food for surface lurkers.

GUEST BLOGGER

I "met" my guest blogger, J.D. Wininger, through our Blue Ridge Bible Study Writers group on Facebook, but I'll meet him in person soon at the Enrich Conference in just a couple of weeks. J.D. writes a wonderful blog each week at "Around the Cross Dubya," and his posts center around the ranch that he and his wife own and take care of. On his blog, he states: "As a Christian writer, my sole desire is to bring glory to God by using the gifts and talents He gave me, in his service." One of those gifts that I've noticed in our friend J.D. is the gift of encouraging. J.D. is faithful to respond to others' posts and comments with some of the most encouraging words I've ever read, words that lend spiritual insight and wisdom to the subject at hand, and words that encourage the writer with kindness and empathy. Please enjoy J.D.'s powerful post below, and then check out his website for more great posts.

Nature’s Webs

by J.D. Wininger

This morning while watering the calves, I glimpsed a grasshopper that seemed to be hanging in mid-air. Like a stop-motion video, I turned to understand what I was looking at. Sure enough, a grasshopper had jumped its way right into a web from one of my garden spiders. Here, it was suspended between the side of one of my stock trailers and its rear gate. As I watched the grasshopper struggle to free itself for about fifteen seconds, I noticed the spider on the other end of the web approaching. It quickly made its way to the prey, subduing it by injecting a toxin.

CONSIDER THE MILLIPEDE

by Julie Lavender

The steamy hot humid nights we’ve had lately in southeast Georgia have brought out a plethora of millipedes on my evening walks with my husband. My morning walks seem to catch those arthropods heading back to daytime shelter after nocturnal foraging for decaying leaves and other dead plant matter.

CONSIDER THE PAINTED LADY BUTTERFLY
by Julie Lavender

Beautiful Painted Lady butterflies caught my attention as I headed out for my morning walk with God. Flitting about the bright-colored lantana blooms, the winged insects searched for sweet nectar amongst the blossoms. Flashes of deep orange against black, with white-spot embellishments, are eye-catching and appealing as the butterflies never seem to sit still for longer than a few seconds.

CONSIDER THE CICADA 
by Julie Lavender

I love my walks with God anywhere, but I especially like the quiet, serene ones that take me out of my neighborhood and away from civilian life. Like the opportunity to hike in the mountains of north Georgia, where I know the roar of vehicles won’t interrupt my thoughts or the occasional plane flying over won’t distract me. Or the pleasant sounds of children playing won’t take me out of my daydreams or prayers.

CONSIDER THE DEVIL'S WALKING STICK
by Julie Lavender

My early morning walk took me past a small stream, and just on the other side, I noticed the prickly-stemmed Devil’s walking stick standing resolute and firm in the bright sunshine.

Named aptly for the sharp, menacing spines all along the trunk, the Devil’s walking stick is a shrub or small tree that grows native in the southeastern United States. Armed with unforgiving prickles on the trunk, the upper portion offers green leaves, late-summer flowers, and juicy black berries.

CONSIDER THE BUTTONBUSH

by Julie Lavender

On a recent afternoon at our family riverhouse, my husband and I paddled downstream and wandered along the banks in a couple of places. One of my favorite shrubs along the water’s edge is the buttonbush.

CONSIDER THE TIGER BEETLE

by Julie Lavender

A small flash of metallic green catches my eye as I head out for my walk with God. Closer inspection reveals a tiger beetle darting amongst the blades of grass in search of food.

Named for the ravenous eating habits of both the larva and adult, tiger beetles eat spiders and an assorted menu of insects. And, boy, can they move!