Today I read that the alert on Mount Redoubt in Alaska is at red (RED: Eruption is imminent with significant emission of volcanic ash into the atmosphere likely OR eruption is underway or suspected with significant emission of volcanic ash into the atmosphere [ash-plume height specified, if possible].) And on the same web page (Alaska Volcano Observatory), I find this photo, taken on my birthday:
What a beautiful, beautiful mountain! We are so blessed to live on an earth that is beautiful. Here is a current readout of the webicorder, just look at all that recent activity. Cool! (or maybe the correct word should be HOT!)
Last night at our team worship time it was commented and wondered at whether there will be mountains and canyons on the New Earth. Mel mentioned that some theologians think those two geographic features are a direct result of sin and the flood and thus will not be on the New Earth. I say: what a sad, pathetic thought. Not Mel's thoughts! but those who look at these things and see only the result of sin. To think that God's perfectly created earth, made just for us, would be smooth as a new cue ball with no high and low features - how very, very sad. I find it equally sad to think that the New Earth and/or New Heaven will be only a city. Ei yi yi!
I look at creation and see the work of God. I see a tiny manifestation of the power of God. And as I've written before, an example of His creativity and beauty. I think God gave us these kinds of things to be a reminder of how great He is and how little we really are. We may be the pinnacle of creation, as I've heard mankind referred to, but we are only a created being on a world created for us. In some ways, seeing the beauty and power of a volcano brings mankind 'back down to size' and brings glory and honor to the Creator of the universe instead. We are not God.
Mankind does such amazing things now - the ISS (International Space Station) is one example, the Mars rovers are another, and the hydrogen bomb and all the other bombs that have followed are even more examples. Yes, mankind can do great things. But can we make the earth quake at a 7.6 as just happened near Tonga? Or can we cause an undersea volcano to erupt? Or cause a series of tornados to devastate a wide area of the American mid-West? No - these things are not in our power. (And I pray they never are!) God can cause them to happen - and He does!
He is still God, and we will continue to remain merely created beings.
How very, very thankful I am for that!
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