Wondrous Apprehension

Today, I hung a framed, 11 by 14 photo of the Pleiades star cluster, also known as the Seven Sisters constellation, on the wall of our church office.  It joins an enlargement of the earth as seen from the moon, the Pillars of Creation, Horsehead Nebula, and a Hubble Ultra-Deep Field photo, along with a photo of the full earth and a full shot of the dwarf planet Pluto.  I have another photo…a panoramic photo taken on the moon by the Apollo 11 crew…in process.  If you can’t tell by now, I like astronomical photos.

I’m not sure why I have a fascination for these kinds of things.  After all, I can’t see this stuff with my eyes only, nor do I have the telescopic means to observe them directly.  I must rely on someone else to see the beauty in the skies and take a high-enough resolution photo that I can have it enlarged and printed.  (The photos themselves, by the way, are in the public domain, having been taken by one or the other governmental agencies.)

For me, observing the beauty in the skies through these kinds of photographs is a kind of worship.  I know how they came into existence and know who holds all of it together.  Of course, I don’t have the scientific knowledge…I have the knowledge that comes by faith…the preponderance of the evidence accompanied by a stepping out of the bounds of mere human experience and into the realm of the reality of the spiritual.

You may have some other means by which you approach the God of the universe in worship.  For you, it might be music.  Or perhaps the miracle of metamorphosis or migration in nature is your thing.  You may look at the human body and marvel at the design.  Or you might see the intangible things such as love, joy, and peace and see their origin in the God of it all.

Whatever it may be, know that you aren’t alone.  Untold millions have looked at the Pleiades, a newborn baby, the monarch butterfly, and other untold phenomena and have broken out in unbridled worship and praise to the God who made it all.  It is a glorious and wondrous thing to be able to transcend the scientific explanations (or lack thereof) and grasp a truth that begs to be apprehended…begs to be known…begs to be embraced.