How Excellent!

This morning I was sitting out on the courtesy dock, over the water, meditating at sunrise. That doesn’t happen all that often anymore. Even great beauty can begin to be common place when you live with it everyday. It was cloudy today and there wasn’t the spectacular sunrise seen in today’s photo, but as my meditation ended I still sat there amazed at the creation of God, remembering the wonderful images of the eclipse we watched via livestream from NASA. There was great emotion coming from people viewing this event — even scientists.

The words of Psalm 18 came to mind.

Psalm 19^[a]

For the director of music. A psalm of David.

¹The heavens declare the glory of God;
    the skies proclaim the work of his hands.
²Day after day they pour forth speech;
    night after night they reveal knowledge.
³They have no speech, they use no words;
    no sound is heard from them.
⁴Yet their voice^[b] goes out into all the earth,
    their words to the ends of the world.
In the heavens God has pitched a tent for the sun.
⁵    It is like a bridegroom coming out of his chamber,
    like a champion rejoicing to run his course.
⁶It rises at one end of the heavens
    and makes its circuit to the other;
    nothing is deprived of its warmth.

As I watched the eclipse as it crossed the country yesterday I remembered the excitement I felt the first time I saw a human brain. I was studying physiological psychology at the time. Our knowledge of how the brain actually worked was still rather limited back then, but I was amazed at how unimpressive an actual human brain outside of the body can be, knowing that the brain is responsible for everything we do and think, waking as well as sleeping. Even our breath and heartbeat are controlled by the brain. In recent years great strides have been made in our understanding of the brain and how it works making it even more amazing that the wonders of human life are controlled by that hunk of gray matter.

When I was in college there was a fear among some Christians that if Christian young people studied science they would become atheists. There are many scientists around the world who are people of faith — people who still stand amazed at the wonders of nature and by studying them believe in God, Creator, life force, what ever name you use, even more.

So if you stood amazed at the Glory of God yesterday as you watched the eclipse, carry that with you in your heart. It is easy to get caught up in the trials and tribulations of daily life and forget. Let your heart be softened and changed by this encounter. Take this memory out from time and time and let your heart sing….

“The heavens declare the Glory of God! “