sunrise, sunset

today i drove the boys into school.

we wake up in the dark and leave really early and the only good thing about that is the sunrise.  but it's a very good thing. it's so beautiful.  a little gift for people who drag themselves up as day begins.
 
i was thinking in that early morning light about how amazing it is that each sunrise is different and how maybe that is one of the ways God reminds us that he's around, that he cares about the details, that he is paying attention.  because they don't all have to be different, but they are.

we wouldn't even have noticed if the world was made to have the same sunrise and sunset everyday- it would still be beautiful.  but, each day, the color, the light, the shape, the spread of the sky in transition, is new.  unique.  full of promise and surprise. as is each day.  there is newness. a beginning. 















it speaks to me. it tells me that God is an artist, and artists love to communicate, to share themselves, to make things that are beautiful or things that make us stop and think and see differently.

that is what the sunrise does if i'm awake to enjoy it.  i stop.  i think.  i see differently.  i appreciate life and love, i feel smaller than i did in the dark, but larger too. and the best part is that it happens twice a day!  this blessing of an open, vulnerable sky.  the arrival and the leaving of the sun, the heat and the light, the cool and the night.

it's not a mistake.  it's not random.
it's too powerful to be an accident. 
it is spectacular.
we are not alone.