“I am His Child
Made with His Love
And it is enough to
Bring me to my knees
He’s reaching down
And I’m reaching up
And somehow I feel
the Maker’s Touch”
– Jenny Phillips, “The Maker’s Touch”
The trail sloping up toward a huge sandstone arch was rocky and dry. Ted, Kenidee, and I were hiking in an area called Behind the Rocks in San Juan County west of the Moab Rim.
The austere landscape was named, according to Faun M. Tanner in Steve Allen’s book, Utah Canyon Country Place Names, because the Moab Rim was once called The Rocks.
In the same book, Ward J. Roylance described the area as “a compact but exceptionally rugged region of slickrock fins and domes and labyrinthine drainage channels, a maze of strange and beautiful erosional forms.”
Rugged seemed an understatement. Before starting our hike to the Moab Rim Arch, we’d driven to Picture Frame and Balcony Arches on a rough road that rocked-and-rolled our little Jeep Patriot and our bodies, but it was worth it.
Picture Frame, as its name suggests, is an unusual, square arch while Balcony Arch has a balcony-like boulder for a base.
After we drove back toward the rim, parked, and started up the hill toward the big arch, Ted strode ahead with Kenidee, our mini schnauzer.
I plodded along more slowly, surprised at how few people were in the area since we were close to Moab, but it was cold. I wore my heavy coat, a winter scarf, and thick gloves. Now and then, billowing clouds obscured the sun, making it even chillier.
I scanned the vegetation. Like the rest of San Juan County, a nearly snowless winter had taken its toll on the junipers, pinions, and sagebrush, and I couldn’t help worrying about the plants, animals, and people trying to survive in the parched landscape.
I wasn’t alone in my concern. Sunday had been designated as a time for Montezuma Creek, Bluff, White Mesa, Blanding, and Monticello to join in fasting and prayer for a heavy snow to blanket the land, soak into the soil, and fill our reservoirs. I knew many Moabites were praying for the same blessing.
It wasn’t the first time our communities had prayed for rain and snow, petitioning the Creator for the water we desperately needed.
Many people were examining their own lives to see if they had anything blocking the flow of divine grace, but it was harder for entire communities to conduct such an examination and harder still to examine the relationships among the small towns with their varied cultures and beliefs.
However, science has proven the efficacy of groups, no matter what their beliefs, meditating or praying together with a focused intention.
Lynn McTaggart, an investigative reporter and author of The Power of Eight, has spent many years researching the effects of unified group intention, conducting experiments as varied as groups promoting plant growth, decreasing violence in war zones, and alleviating the suffering incurred from accidents or chronic illness.
Her experiments are ongoing, but she’s documented that even groups as small as eight can have a profound impact if a clear, unselfish intention shapes their meditation or prayer.
Not only were our communities praying with a focused intention, but we were also fasting.
According to Copilot, fasting has myriad physical benefits, including improved heart health, lessened inflammation, better brain function, cancer prevention, and others, but we wouldn’t be abstaining from food for our health.
We were fasting to humble ourselves and tune into the Creator’s will, not an easy thing for stubborn humans with needs and agendas of our own.
All of this was going through my head as we hiked along the sandstone cliffs, knobs, and domes.
We found a beautiful hollow off the trail and prayed, offering our need for water to God. Then, we ate our lunch and climbed to the Moab Rim Arch.
As I peered up at the magnificent formation, its curve suddenly lifted my mind upward. Surely, the Maker who created this rugged landscape could pile up the clouds, making them so pregnant with water they could not withhold the snow we needed.
Perhaps because we were alone in such beauty and silence, His compassion seemed to flow down, permeating every tree, every blade of desert grass, every cottontail, and every human, including the ones staring up at the arch.
Because my heart felt lighter — and the path sloped downhill — the hike back to the Jeep seemed easy and fast.
The snow didn’t come right away, not on Sunday, Monday, or even Tuesday. Probably everyone who participated in the prayer pulled up the weather app several times every day, checking and hoping.
It didn’t come until the end of the following week, the night of February 13th and the morning of Valentine’s Day.
When it came, it was heavy, full of water, and hard to scoop. Our neighbors across the street are cattle ranchers, and she was out shoveling. “This is the best!” she yelled at us.
We agreed. We shouldn’t have been so surprised at the exact answer to our prayers.
Later that morning, an out-of-region friend called. “Did you get snow?”
“Yes,” I said, “about five inches, very heavy, very wet.”
“We just got a quarter of an inch of rain.”
“Rain is good,” I countered.
“You guys are so lucky,” she said.
“We are so blessed,” I said, remembering the soaring, red arch and the Creator’s compassion shimmering across the land.
Visiting Behind the Rocks and the blessed power of prayer
