The Ordinary is Extraordinary!

Mary Ann working on her cast.

Last Sunday our family left for our "weekend" and slipped up to the Sierra Nevada Mountains after church for some fellowship and fishing. We love what happens in our hearts above 5,000 feet when the rivers are flowing with clear, cold water and the breeze blows through the tall trees that cover the rock covered mountains. Bethany caught a trout while we were there, Abigail became an amazing "caster," and Mary Ann and I got to practice fly fishing. There is something so beautiful about that line curling up in the air above and behind a person as they gently drop the fly into the stream or pool. The new header for this blog is a picture of our family from our trip (if you are reading this by email subscription you'll need to go to the blog to see it). It was wonderful, refreshing, and beautiful—and the fact that we shared the couple of days with some wonderful people up there who love the Lord and our family made it especially sweet.

On the way home Tuesday night we headed straight west for awhile, right into a sunset. The sun was slipping down behind the far hills and there must have been a haze or something out there because it was a big, orange ball that you could actually look at. I have seen hundreds of sunsets in my life, and there was nothing in and of itself spectacular about this one, but for some reason it really struck Mary Ann and I at the same time. Maybe it is because this last year or two God has been awakening me to the awe and wonder of His Creation in the heavens and I have been learning a lot, and sharing a lot, about them. Normally, during the day, you can't look at the sun. It is this ball of light in the corner of our eye that we take for granted. It is normal. But Tuesday night we couldn't not stare at it as it was straight in front of us right on the horizon. To take our eyes off it would be to take them off the road. As we stared at it we both were like, "That is a star!"

I don't know that this will make much sense, but there is a sense, at least for me, that I see all these stars out there at night, and then during the day there is our sun. Maybe it is because I equate stars with night, but it often eludes my conscious thought that the sun is a star. I know it intellectually, but fail to focus on that fact. It is just "the sun" in the sky, and it is "normal." Tuesday night, however, we both found ourselves in awe, realizing we were staring at a star—a great big, massive, ball of gas and fire that would consume us long before we ever got to it! We were staring at a star and it was big and it was close! It was astounding. It was awe inspiring. There is this star just a skip away in light year terms that we are circling around. We are feeling its heat. Its blazing light is lighting up our earth. It is so big and so powerful that nothing man has ever created is a fraction of its power. According to one web site, if we could harness it right, enough energy arrives at our earth every minute to meet all of our demands for a year—and that is with only about a hundredth of a millionth of a percent of the sun's energy actually hitting our earth! It is so mighty, and yet we (at least I) take it for granted and take our proximity to it for granted. I am afraid that in this, and in many things, I have let the extraordinary become ordinary.

Clouds . . .

A cloud picture I once took.

A cloud picture I once took.

A cloud picture I once took.

A cloud picture I once took.

This afternoon Mary Ann and I were sitting outside having a cup of coffee and huge, billowing white clouds were blowing by. I love looking at clouds. They fascinate me! These were especially beautiful as the sky was such a deep blue, and the new leaves of the oak trees such a vibrant green, that the clouds really stood out and made all the other colors stand out as well.

I wonder, how long has it been since you ever really thought about clouds, and stopped and just watched them. Truly, they are fascinating! Think about it—water weighs just over eight pounds per gallon . . . and those clouds hold sometimes thousands and thousands of gallons of water in them. Just picture the water that comes out of them during a good storm when you can get multiple inches of rain in a day or a weekend. And yet, at eight pounds a gallon (imagine trying to lift thousands of one-gallon water bottles!) it remains aloft, suspended in some form, floating above us!

I know that scientists can explain all of it, and they use all these technical reasons and words for it, but don’t let that steal from you the childlike simplicity and wonder of simply a cloud. If man had tried to invent a way to suspend thousands, or millions, of gallons of water above him can you imagine the size of the vessel, or container, it would require, and the amount of lift it would take to get it up there, let alone keep it up there or move it around?!

Yet, somehow, the water hangs up there, is blown about effortlessly by the wind, is visible and yet we can put our hand right through it, defies gravity, and is painted with amazing colors at sunset and sunrise. It is truly a miracle of design when you think about it. Sadly, many would have you believe that these, too, (just like they claim about you), are a chance product of accident with no intelligent design behind them. Maybe it is no wonder that God says we must come to Him as little children . . . when we get old we get the truth that is obvious to a child educated right out of us.

Take time, today, I encourage you, to simply stare up at clouds and marvel . . . and, if you need to do it through a window, stop for a moment and think of how amazing glass is also—that you can see completely through, without even noticing it, something that is totally solid, and yet totally invisible. A product of accident, or design? I don’t need to wonder. It is truly “clear” to me!

May God awaken in you today a renewed, childlike wonder at His creation and may you find your eyes and heart and hands lifted to Him in awe and worship.
Erick 

Note: In my browser (I don't know about yours) you can click on one of the cloud pictures and it will take you to an enlarged version of the picture for you to enjoy. Then, simply click on the back arrow to return to the post.