His

His

The heavens are yours, and the earth is yours; everything in the world is yours—you created it all.

“I FOUND AN ABANDONED QUARTZ MINE with lots of good-sized quartz chunks. It was at the end of a dirt trail I decided to follow.” Smiling, I listened as my dad told me about his latest adventure on public land in a western state, wondering how many hundreds of people had passed by that trail.

Dad once told me that he feels close to God when he is outside, immersed in creation. In that way, I am most definitely my father’s daughter. I am reminded of God’s sovereignty over even the hardest things I face in the shadow of mountains, the stillness of forests, and on the edges of oceans, and I find peace as I compare my puny, fleeting existence to the immense timelessness of his earth.

But it’s his tender care revealed in the tiniest details of creation that serves as a tangible reminder that the same God who created and named the stars also counts the strands of hair on our heads. When the storms of life rage, we are not abandoned. I hear God’s love when a robin trills for the first time each spring. I feel God’s love as I bask in those first warm rays of the sun in March, knowing spring is just around the corner. I see God’s love when I find an agate half buried in the mud, the beautiful red and white swirls revealed with a swipe of my thumb against the dirt. I smell God’s love on the warm days when the melting snow reveals the scent of fresh, wet earth. I taste God’s love in the raspberries that never quite make it to the house because the neighborhood children delight in my invitation to eat their fill straight from the brambles.

Everything is God’s. He created it, and he reveals himself in all of it—from the sweeping panoramas to fragile butterfly wings. And as much as he loves his creation, he loves and cares for us more. We are his beloved.

Lord, we are yours. Remind us of your sovereignty, your love, your provision for those who seek first your Kingdom (see Matthew 6:33). Amen.

-Julie

One Good Step: Find a quiet place outside. What do you feel, smell, taste, hear, and see that reminds you of God’s sovereignty and his love?