Jeremy L. Berg

On my 45th birthday retreat, I tested my now middle-aged legs and lungs on a morning hike this week to the top of the bluffs at Thrive Park in the Village of Nelson, Wisconsin, near Lake Pepin. The terrain I traversed was known as “goat prairies” because it was thought only goats could reach them. The verdict is in: I’m getting old and out of shape. I huffed and puffed up the steep trails and tested my balance (and leg and butt muscles) coming back down the steep embankment.

Gary “Chris” Christopherson is the owner of the park and expert guide to the land and trails. He told me which trail route might be best for me, and warned me not to come down the steep bluff on the circular route, but to retrace my steps and come down the way I came up. “That route is for seasoned hikers, and you’re not wearing proper shoes anyway,” he kindly warned me. I ignored him, and almost lived to regret it or didn’t live to tell the story. Almost. 

Gary’s last words of advice to me before I set out was to not rush back down, but to sit at the top and enjoy the spectacular view of the Mississippi River Valley and Lake Pepin from the rocky ledge. “It’s a shame how many people spend all that time hiking up, only to come directly back down after a quick glance and a selfie ,” he lamented. “Sit down and take in the view.” This advice I heeded, and my 30 or 40 minutes sitting like the famous “Thinking Man” statue yielded a meaningful experience which I’ll now try to put into words. 

The rocky outcrop of the bluff is called Pike’s Peak and looks down on the small Village of Nelson with a population of 320. Sitting high above the village, the tiny cars and houses looked like game board pieces, tiny plastic houses from Monopoly and plastic cars and pin-headed people from the game of Life. The people were colorful walking specks, little dots just like us towering over an ant colony.

I would call this a bird’s-eye-view, except for the fact that I was looking down (!) on a turkey vulture soaring high and majestically above the trees and village. The little village below reminded me of the model neighborhood at the beginning of Mister Roger’s Neighborhood, only much smaller and further away.

I was enjoying a rare God’s-eye-view of this small village, and I spent the next 30 minutes watching over and studying the distant movements of these ant-like creatures going about their daily business in an all but forgotten hamlet in rural Wisconsin. Here are a few observations. 

First, my eyes were drawn to a tiny speck driving in a rectangular pattern on a green surface. Each time around, the square grew a bit smaller, with the area traversed having a slightly lighter shade of green. What a strange little pattern this dot was following. Was the creature lost? Confused? Dizzy? I imagined looking down on an ant moving in circles like that, and how strange that behavior would appear. Yet I knew I was looking down on a person dutifully doing an activity I happen to spend much of my precious life doing: mowing the grass. 

Back down in People Land, mowing one’s yard seems necessary and meaningful. The smell of fresh cut grass on a summer evening as neighbors gather on the back deck for BBQ. The way the house and landscaping look after its been mowed. Or the frustration toward the lazy neighbor with the unkempt yard on the block, situated between two manicured home and garden expo lawns.

For me, mowing our 3 acres brings much joy and satisfaction, as it’s one of the few tasks I set my hand to each week that brings instant, visible results. On ground level, the rows of freshly cut grass stand out in contrast to the long uncut grass. On ground level, the 2 hours riding in circles on a lawn tractor soothes my soul and brings a degree of aesthetic glee.

But back on top of that bluff, the little dot moving in circles on the green square didn’t make as much of an impact. All the yards, or green squares, looked the same from that height—whether mowed or un-mowed, chemically treated or full of crab grass and creeping Charlie. Nevertheless, I felt compassion for the little dot going in circles. I watched over him or her, as God watchers over me as I laboriously change the shade of my little green rectangle around my tiny home each week. 

I then looked at the village as a whole, and saw a kind of gridded quilt like tapestry of life and home. In each square, a family of tiny dots are living out the creation mandate to “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it” (Gen. 1:28). In other words, taking care of their little green square and all the life that lives within it. That tiny, meandering dot moving in circles wasn’t dizzy, confused, or lost; the creature was worshiping God and cultivating their little 1/3 acre slice of Eden. There is dignity in all the small and mundane endeavors that go into tending our little squares that make up God’s great and expansive tapestry. 

Second, my eyes scanned the rest of the little town and took note of other business and activity underway. I saw a couple little dots walking behind smaller furry dots down the street. A man at a stand selling fireworks for the 4th of July. A farmer on a large tractor trying to contend with his drowning field. The most noticeable part of town from that height is the trailer campground shaped like a giant question mark.

I imagined the lives of the little elderly dots whose long and tiring working and child-rearing years have led them to this little community of fellow retirees now trying to enjoy rest and leisure in their twilight years. I concluded that this is a very small and quiet village, and if you’re looking for action, you’ll need to keep driving further north or south down the Mississippi.

However, as I studied the tiny dots moving about town, I did find an epicenter of buzzing activity around a white building with a steeple. Zooming in I saw little dot cars parking up and down the street and around the block of the white building situated in the very center of town. It was 10:30 a.m. Dozens of dots paraded in a line like ants into the building, and would process out again in an hour carrying a wooden box to a special dot vehicle that would lead a procession of dot cars in a line to a special green square full of engraved stones on the outskirts of town. 

Suddenly, I was reminded that I was not watching ants. Ants don’t gather in steepled buildings to commit their dead to God and the ground. Ants may walk in a line to build their colony, but they don’t process in a line to bury the fallen. Suddenly, I was moved deeply as I witnessed the sacred significance of my pastoral calling on display in this little village from my perch in the heavens. 

Most of my days down in People Land have me feeling quite peripheral and forgotten in the midst of our busy suburban lives. Yet, as I observed all the activity I could see happening in that quiet town on this ordinary weekday morning, no activity was as sacred, as extraordinary, as steeped in meaning and significance as the funeral service happening inside that little white church.

Eternity was touching the hearts and minds of the sad little dots gathered under that roof. The Father Who Art in Heaven high above my perch was descending to wipe the tears of the tiny dots below. For that hour, half of the population of Nelson was gathered under that steeple and being ministered to by some nondescript, no-name minister of the gospel and servant of Christ. 

Sitting high above the village, wind blowing in my face, I could not hear any of the sounds of life below. I couldn’t make out the laughter of the junior dots playing at the park, nor could I hear the muffled sobs of grieving dots as they filed out of the church. I am just a hiker sitting on a high bluff on my birthday, contemplating life, death and all its mysteries. But on that perch, studying the dots below, I was given a new perspective and a God’s eye view of my own life in all its meaning and meandering, victories and vicissitudes. 

I am small and vulnerable, but watched over from on high. I have a small square of Eden to cultivate and protect, and my square is part of a much greater whole. The church and its ministries of Word and Sacraments ought to stand at the center of our lives, a place for hallowed beginnings and dignified endings. Unlike me on the windy bluff, the God who watches over us sees into each tiny home, hears every unspoken prayer and weary whimper, and in the fullness of time left His heavenly perch and “moved into the neighborhood” (John 1:14 MSG). 

On my 45th birthday, I’m sealing that spectacular view from above into my imagination and memory. I’m thanking God for the central place of that tiny church and its faithful pastor that little village. I’m thanking God for planting the flag of eternal hope in the center of little forgotten towns and big cities alike—each populated by precious souls in need of God’s visitation and compassion from on high. 

As I made my way down the bluff, recklessly disregarding the warnings of Gary and taking the more direct  (and dangerously steep) way back, I almost lost my footing and fell headlong. I kept my nerve and I kept my balance, and returned to People Land with a greater appreciation for the God-Man whose reckless love led him from heaven’s bluff down into the dark valley of sin and death.

Back in my car and driving through the streets of the village, I waved at the man selling fireworks. I smiled at the two friends walking their dogs. I appreciated the fresh cut lawn as I drove by. And I inadvertently joined the procession of cars and followed it out to the cemetery, and thanked God for another year of life down here in the land of the Tiny Dots under God’s great and gracious gaze.