I find life, good and bad, overwhelming when I stop to consider the details. This isn’t negative; it is a “wow” response to incredible, awesome, and unending details that compose our never ending symphony.
It is easy to get lost in the Redwoods. The trees reach out to heaven in ways that never end. The rivers pursue paths that anyone who sees a point in time wants to follow. Birds, butterflies, snakes, insects on the water, and animals flood the scene everywhere one cares to look. Even the hand of man scarring the hillsides with logging is offset by nature’s relentless creative abilities. The crisp mornings, hot days, and windy evenings bring cycles of renewal to one’s attention in fresh and creative ways.
Yet, even with all this beauty the specter of evil is never far. People carry their pain, unable to shed the sorrow, bleeding emotional centers, and scars left by nature’s aberrations. If that wasn’t enough death intrudes event the most sacred times bring a harsh blinding reality into crisp focus.
This is a pattern that cannot continue! Even with nature and man resiliency there is a limit that cannot be exceeded. I wonder aloud as I look at the beauty and awe around me why others as well as myself lose sight of this, but reality is often wrapped in fog. When the scene reaches a climax, my cry for justice and an emergence of eternal beauty finds a home in John’s record of what will be our reality.
“A strong Angel reached for a boulder—huge, like a millstone—and heaved it into the sea, saying, “Heaved and sunk, the great city Babylon, sunk in the sea, not a sign of her ever again. Silent the music of harpists and singers—you’ll never hear flutes and trumpets again. Artisans of every kind—gone; you’ll never see their likes again… The only thing left of Babylon is blood—the blood of saints and prophets, the murdered and the martyred.” (Revelation 18.21-24)
Given what is coming, what is the focus of our awe today?
