Eyes and ears for a new year

Don't count on bold font. Pick up on less obvious hints, reflections, shadows and glints. Telegraphed via hunches, slight nudges and winks. Familiar voice or stranger. Subtle traces in a boring Sunday sermon. Old story, new song, or an odd sequence of events that makes you go, "Hmmm?"

The voice of the spirit. The value is unmeasured. With a word your world can turn on a dime. Just know, it can be elusive, playing hard to get, kept for those who ache with desire. Now like a dove, next a bird of prey, the voice must be tended and treasured lest it take offense, take wing and fly away.

Romance the treasure. Pursue. And when you're lucky, the voice romances you. Clever messenger snags your notice like a brier catches flannel, like a deftly stolen kiss or lover's covert whisper. "Tap, tap, tap" at your center. In holy writ or movie line. In metaphor ensconced in good fiction. Betwixt desperate pleas and answered prayer. In a wilderness without words, 'cause the word is not always wordy, and seasons of silence are not without meaning. Stillness can preach. Add to your playlist the poetry of quiet -- the eloquence of silence. If you're addicted to noise, you're trying not to hear.

If you want to hear, talk less; you can't listen well while talking. To listen is to love. Avoid dripline doomscrolling and anesthetizing newsfeed addiction (probably not the voice of the spirit). Misdirection distorts reality. Be wary of hyper-literal Bible reading that misses the forest for the trees. And you'll do well to dismiss worn out leftover laments from yesterday. Exclusivity, unkindness, unforgiveness, alienation, rationed mercy, bitterness, fear and rage; these leave us myopic, hard of hearing and less human. I should know.

In serendipitous discovery or disappointing delay, we can see/hear if we remain attentive: a turn of phrase that turns your ear, or fallout fragments of past years -- lessons to learn from your want-to and tears. Pick up the scent. Track the cold trail, gathering pieces, collecting clues.

Here's to the new wear! May we have eyes to see and ears to hear and pursue like jealous lovers. The spirit keeps a diary, but leaves the key in the lock, hopeful we're brave enough to peek, privy to the love lines. Be wakeful, alive; stay hungry. Want it all badly enough to create new habits. Mind the radar. Put up antenna. Put yourself out there and pursue.

ROD PARCHMAN is a minister in Cunningham, Tennessee, with ties to Bollinger County.