beauty

Out With the Old, In With the New!

(In the winter of life, the past remains even though life constantly changes.) “Out with the old, in with the new” is a grand but totally impractical New Year’s expectation! Celebratory gatherings, festive toasts, fireworks, and a few seconds of Auld Lang Syne somehow allow a brief reprieve from the baggage and sadness of theContinue reading “Out With the Old, In With the New!”

Go! Tell It!

John Wesley Work Jr. was an African American educator and musicologist who compiled, “harmonized,” and published a number of slave songs which came to light during the Great Migration of Blacks from the southern states to the north after the civil war. “Go Tell It On the Mountain” dates back at least to 1865 andContinue reading “Go! Tell It!”

From Disorder to Order

We live in a magnificently beautiful, physical world from which we gather inklings and snippets of something even more grand, but these glimpses quickly fade because something is wrong! We do not live in Eden. We live with imperfections—dead trees, decaying vegetation, fading colors, dark clouds, dangerous mountain passes, rocky shores, raging waters, and tragicContinue reading “From Disorder to Order”

Behold!

Maybe it’s a butterfly on a tangerine cone flower or an expansive, breathtaking vista. It might be minuscule and cellular or cosmic and grand; simple and stark or intricate and complex; lovely and serene or loud and boisterous; man made or God created. It might be a song, a symphony, a discovery, or an idea.Continue reading “Behold!”

A Vacancy?

A fresh, early summer morning; fog lingering down the bay; smells from the sea; beauty all around! Beautiful but empty! We know how to present cheerful facades when actually feeling empty. We hope nobody will detect our loneliness. “Laughter can conceal a heavy heart, but when the laughter ends, the grief remains. (Proverbs 14:13) LikeContinue reading “A Vacancy?”

The Beauty of the Earth

For the beauty of the earthFor the beauty of the skiesFor the love which from our birthOver and around us lies, Lord of all, to thee we raiseThis our joyful hymn of praise For the beauty of each hourOf the day and of the nightHill and vale and tree and flowerSun and moon and starsContinue reading “The Beauty of the Earth”

Inaudible Shouts…

“Magnificent!”. “Glorious!” Beautiful!” Those exclamations echoed around the garden as visitors admired the flowering shrubs and peony blossoms. The adage that “Beauty lies in the eye of the beholder” holds some truth. We have individual aesthetics or preferences and subjectively value the quality of the tangible or intangible. So, is beauty a reality or anContinue reading “Inaudible Shouts…”

I was reminded today that beauty surrounds us—and not just in what we behold! We were created to perceive beauty with all our senses–the pleasures that we experience, the music that we hear, the art that we create. Beauty may lie in a concept or an action– a Mother’s love, service to God and ourContinue reading “Beauty”

Maine Lupines

Whether viewing the magnificence and grandeur of our cosmos through a telescope, the naked eye, or a microscope , in the words of the Apostle Paul we are “clearly” seeing God’s invisible qualities–His eternal power and divine nature. A field of lupine in the Spring is not only glorious but is an amazing statement ofContinue reading “Maine Lupines”