Readings: Psalm 148; Acts 7:59-8:8
As I was driving home to Seattle today after spending Christmas with my family, I caught sunlight off the mountains over the river that runs alongside a portion of I-5. I pulled over. Despite the traffic and my ever-present need to beat my last drive time, I pulled over.
And for once, I did not reach for my phone. I just didn’t care about capturing it in that moment.
Instead, I reached for God.
The God that I always say raised me when no one else seemed to want to. The one that I never feared despite how often the Bible says to “fear the Lord” and how much that was pounded into my by my fire and brimstone upbringing. The God that has taken my angry rants and shaking fists and poured back grace upon grace. The only being that I cannot see but can feel in my deepest being when I cry out. The God who I have felt forgotten by only to look up and be reminded…by the sunlight on the river, by the purr of the fat orange cat who adores me for no reason, in the laughter of my friends…that God is still with me, in me, around me.
As I sat there staring at the beauty of the sunlight on the water with the green (always green!) covered mountains behind, I reached for God.
And God reached back.
All mountains and hills,
fruit trees and cedars,
every wild and tame animal,
all reptiles and birds,
come praise the Lord!
Every king and every ruler,
all nations on earth,
every man and every woman,
young people and old,
come praise the Lord!
All creation, come praise
the name of the Lord.
Praise his name alone.
The glory of God is greater
than heaven and earth. (Psalm 148: 9-13)
