The beauty of a starlit night

It’s quiet. It’s very dark. The blackness seems to bring the stars close enough that I can almost grasp them with my fingers. There are more than I can count: I try but then the dog impatiently tapping my leg reminds me that I did come outside for a purpose. I throw the rope toy into the night and watch Hogan run after it, I think. I can’t see him anymore so my eyes return to the sky. Perhaps it’s the north sky that intrigues me. Perhaps it’s the vastness or God and the smallness I feel in my heart. I cry out praises and fears and feel so empowered and a helpless. How can I feel both? The incredible greatness of a God who created such mystery and then chose me to love. A God who holds my hand when I am petrified, pushing me off the Diving board when I am too afraid to take that last step and the God who claps slowly and singularly when I have a major victory that only he and I understand. That’s my God. I look from massive star banks across the sky to see the constellation patterns I came to love as a child. Big Dipper, North Star and Orion’s Belt leap out at my heart. If God takes time to make my heart jump with joy on a cold dark night in November when it seems the world is falling apart, what will he do next to show me he loves me? I stand in the cold until the dog comes back dropping his toy. The beauty I cannot take my eyes off. A tear runs down from my eye as I stoop to pick up the toy and throw it again. “I see the stats, I hear the rolling Thunder, thy power throughout the universe displayed. Then sings my soul my savior God to thee, How great thou art.” On a cold cold night with snow crunching under my feet in northern Wisconsin Dee away from the real world- I love the way God gives me glimpses of his glory on a day I really needed a sign that he is still in control.