Category: Creation

All things sing of His Glory

talk about your social distancing. . .*

“I am alone now, truly alone, and absolutely isolated from any known life.  I am it.” Astronaut Michael Collins, Apollo 11

Remember Astronaut Michael Collins on the first moonwalk 50-years ago?  No, I don’t either. 🙂 🙂 🙂

Actually I do.  About every 2-hours Michael Collins, in the Command Module, Columbia, flew over Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong after their descent to the lunar surface in the Lunar Lander, Eagle, and were the astronauts who first walked on the moon.

. . . and one plus God only knows what on this side.  I feel this powerfully — not as fear or loneliness — but as awareness, anticipation, satisfaction, confidence, almost exultation.  I like the feeling.

Let’s backtrack a little.  3-Days earlier the Columbia crew fired their main engine, for TLI, that is Translunar Injection.  This ‘burn’ set their trajectory away from orbiting earth in favor of traveling to the moon.  That is: they pointed the Columbia to travel to where the moon’s position would be 3-days (approximately 40-degrees) ahead of the moon’s present position.  You have to plan ahead, you know.

I have fortunately lived in the space-era, the ‘space race’ — ‘we HAD to beat those Russians’ to the moon, no second choice in the matter!  Amazing what a little ‘friendly competition’ can accomplish.  President Kennedy said in outlining the mission to go to the moon AND RETURN safely, “. . .not because it is easy, but because it is hard.” Continue reading “talk about your social distancing. . .*”

Make “My Monet”

. . .is the pic you made, making, yet to make.

The title could be “Make Your Monet”, but I wanted you to think personally about yourself.

As Monet, amongst the world’s best painters of art from long ago, created masterpieces to capture the world for thought and reflection: inspiration and drive, to spark memories and taunt us to re-order our mental dispositions — make your personal marks, that is brushstrokes, for and with God.

I say for God and with God because your are working to showcase God’s working in you, yet not alone for God has taken up residence in you:

∞ Prods
∞                   Illuminates                                Initiates
∞         Follows                                        Precedes
∞    Guides                                                                           Waits to see
∞                                 Can’t wait to see what you do
∞      Shows His Love                         Undergirds

 

Your “Monet” is how you “paint” God’s “colors”, or influences in your life. Continue reading “Make “My Monet””

The Fullness Thereof

 

Earth.  Lord.  Fullness. = Nice.

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Earth
sharing God’s character
reveling in God’s ways
our existence
breath

Continue reading “The Fullness Thereof”

I see ripples of this fullness
weaving through our daily lives. . .

 

Psalm 24: 1  “The Earth is the Lord’s, and the fullness thereof. . .”

אֶרֶץ – Earth (pronounced eh’-rets)
יְהוָֹה – the LORD (Jehovah)
מְלא – Fills, fullness, multitude (Mel-o’)
[The other English words: the, is, and, thereof – are for clarity in the English language.]

 

Earth.  Lord.  Fullness. = Nice.

***********************************

Earth
sharing God’s character
reveling in God’s ways
our existence
breath

Continue reading “The Fullness Thereof”

Summer of the Monarchs — Butterfly

Monarch Butterflies has been a theme for us this summer!

These creatures are only one creature in a sea of creatures on this amazing planet.  Spending their Summers eating, growing, cocooning (is that an actual word?), then flying as winged insects resembling something that could not possibly be worthy of flight.  At the end of the Summer their instincts prod them to fly to Mexico and hangout for the winter; to return in the spring and start the process over again!

Yahoo!!!

The details of the close ups reveal some amazing qualities!  Look at the proboscis, hairs on the body behind the head, the silk-like threads on the top of the cocoon.  Cocoon shots are of the same cocoon.

 

For years, I have intentionally let grow some of the Milkweed poking through the Spring grass in the yard, mowing around it because Monarch Butterflies lay their eggs, and the minuscule young caterpillars — they need an immediate, nearby food source — greedily begin eating and growing.  Monarchs are having a difficulties in today’s world and any help contributes to their well-being.  They spend the Summers: hatching, growing, reproducing; repeat.

The 4-stages of growth: egg,  caterpillar (larva), chrysalis (pupa), adult (emerge from chrysalis).

By the way, these great people were at our great county fair with butterflies, plants, butterfly house, and some great information.

http://thebutterflyexperience.net/lifecycle-of-the-butterfly.html

Appreciate a creature God wants us to enjoy. Help out a Monarch Butterfly if you can!

 -Jeff

Some Sights of Spring 2017

Some Pictures from the yard mostly taken this spring.  Winter dragged on some and the weather has been cooler, rainier, and overcast.  But never-the-less: Spring has come to the western edge of the Adirondacks!  The bird is a female Eastern Phoebe.  She and her mate used a lot of moss to bring last year’s nest– situated on top of an outdoor light underneath the soffit, a very, very safe place away from cats, rain, hail, or wind — back to life.  It will not be long until the eggs will hatch.

It is like our God to bring life where, for a while, there was none.

EWoodPewee DSC00340
DSC06996 copy
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DSC06853 copy
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E Phoebe Female - DSC00350
E Phoebe Male - DSC00357
E Phoebe Day Before Flight - DSC00361
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The first Eastern Phoebe picture, in the top row, shows the Mother-to-be incubating the eggs.  And she is in the larger photo, on the left, at the bottom.  To her right, the Male is at the nest.  This was witnessed only two times and both were to feed the fledglings by stuffing a bug into a mouth — one bug, one chick, one feeding.  Then go find another bug.

Note the differences between the adults.  The male’s chest and belly are more rounded than the female.  This was more distinct after all the eggs were laid.  Also, the markings on her underside are more subtle and fewer in number.

Everyone “flew the coop” either late on Sunday evening (Father’s Day) or before 7:30 Monday morning — it is hard to say just when.  After a thunderstorm Sunday evening, as the sun was beyond the horizon (in was fairly dark out and it is shaded where the nest is), I could not tell if anyone was in the nest.  We have not seen or heard their calls since.

And, presently, Summer is here!

Jeff