My family and I enjoyed our two week vacation to the American Southwest. We spent our time in the Four Corners states of New Mexico, Arizona, Utah, and Colorado. We traveled for three days from Michigan to Carlsbad Caverns National Park in New Mexico. In the Land of Enchantment we also went to Taos, Santa Fe, and Albuquerque, and worshiped with the Christian Reformed congregation in Rehoboth. We also visited the Four Corners National Monument, Mesa Verde National Park in Colorado, Petrified Forest National Park in Arizona, Grand Canyon National Park in Arizona, Arches National Park in Utah, crossed the Rocky Mountains, and spent a day and a half in Denver, Colorado, before making our way back to Michigan. We saw so many amazing things on our trip that it’s hard to put into words – from the delicately shaped stalagmites and stalactites in Carlsbad Caverns to the brilliant sunset from Sandia Peak to the cliff dwelling ruins of Mesa Verde to the multihued dunes of the Painted Desert to the awesome depths of the Grand Canyon to the massive stone sentinels of Shiprock and Monument Valley to the fantastic sandstone spans of Arches National Park. We certainly experienced the majesty and wonder of God’s creation on a new level. The natural wonder that left the greatest impression on me was the Grand Canyon. I had seen that massive chasm as a teenager but was just as awed when I saw it again. As you look out over the canyon from the South Rim, your senses can’t fully take in the immensity of the expanse before your feet. The tiny ribbon of the Colorado River that you can barely see is 300 feet across. The California condor that you see catching the thermals with its 9 foot wingspan looks like a flying insect far below. The Bright Angel Trail looks like a white thread on a sea of brown and green terrain. The canyon displays God’s grandeur like nothing else in the entire world. Seeing such a magnificent structure crafted by the hand of God gives a person perspective. God providentially gave me the Grand Canyon’s perspective right when I needed it. The morning before we headed to the canyon, the news outlets were announcing the Supreme Court’s decision to strike down a clause of the Defense of Marriage Act as unconstitutional and that those defending Proposition 8 in California supporting traditional marriage didn’t have the proper standing. I was discouraged by this judicial double-blow to biblical marriage in America. The Grand Canyon helped to restore my vision of God’s grand design. The God who made America’s grandest canyon is infinitely greater than any judge, ruler, or nation. Nothing can stop his plan to redeem the world through his Son Jesus Christ. The Grand Canyon and every other square inch of this universe will one day be the home of righteousness. Of course, this doesn’t mean that we Christians sit passively as Satan seeks to undermine God’s created institutions. God chooses to work through us as his agents of truth and love. But that day, I needed a renewed perspective. And God gave me that perspective as my family and I witnessed his grandeur on the edge of America’s greatest canyon. Pastor Mark “Who has measured the waters in the hollow of his hand, or with the breadth of his hand marked off the heavens? Who has held the dust of the earth in a basket, or weighed the mountains on the scales and the hills in a balance?....Surely the nations are like a drop in a bucket; they are regarded as dust on the scales…” (Isaiah 40:12, 15).
Posted on: Wed, 10 Jul 2013 15:16:36 +0000
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