The Things That Are Made

Back in that summer of 2005, my husband and I took a huge 10-year anniversary trip--8 months late, but all because we wanted to see Alaska in the month of June. And, this is Alaska in June...at least up in the mountains:

An old mining camp turned tourist attraction near Anchorage Alaska.

It was a phenomenal trip, and when I arrived back home, I found myself reflecting on the poetic usage of mountains in scripture in a whole new way.

A "typical" view leaves this flat-lands girl breathless.

June 23, 2005
"Lift thine eyes to the mountains, whence comes thy strength."
Mt. McKinley rises 20,000 feet. Only 1,200 people try to climb it per year, and only 50% of those actually make it to the summit. Those that do make it fly in at 7,000 feet just to start their climb. With the help of a guide, these climbers' trek takes them 3 weeks and requires proper gear and outerwear or they freeze to death. No wonder we're told His ways are above our ways! No wonder these are the leading example of His incomprehensible strength!

A "lucky" day: when Mt. McKinley is visible from below--especially with a high-powered zoom working its magic.

Mount McKinley is so massive and so tall that it is only visible 3 out of 10 days. The other 7 days, it is "making its own weather" which obscures the view from below.

I'm thinking about the verse in Mark 11:
For verily I say unto you, That whosoever shall say unto this mountain, Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea; and shall not doubt in his heart, but shall believe that those things which he saith shall come to pass; he shall have whatsoever he saith. (vs. 23)

One of the things I learned about these mountains in Alaska is that the moving weight of ice in glaciers grinds the rock of a mountain into a powder called rock flour. This flour moves down the mountain in the melted-water streams and rivers. It gives the moving water a pewter cast and a distinctive smell. These streams fed by glaciers are unique because of how they originate, although they follow a typical stream's course on its way to the sea.

Do I ever consider how God casts mountains into the sea every day in His own time and way? And, how does this relate to Christ's words? Nothing in His statement addresses timing. Is the miraculous nature of his statement all related to immediacy--that God's timing bows to man's and His 1000-year norm meets man's 1-day? These "miracles" are ongoing, everyday events in a different environment from that of the Middle East in Bible times. They are the norm in the frigid North. It is an interesting thing to ponder.

Sometime later, I had the thought occur to me that snow operates as the world's way of representing of the role of prophecy in the heart of mankind. Snow comes and rests on the ground, visible to the eye, but ineffective in watering the earth until it melts some time later.

Psa 147:16	He giveth snow like wool: he scattereth the hoarfrost like ashes.
Psa 147:17	He casteth forth his ice like morsels: who can stand before his cold?
Psa 147:18	He sendeth out his word, and melteth them: he causeth his wind to blow, [and] the waters flow.
Psa 147:19	He sheweth his word unto Jacob, his statutes and his judgments unto Israel.

Verses such as these seem to confirm this more spiritual aspect of snow--giving it a new level of God-breathed honor, something that out-reached even its natural loveliness. But I had not thought through such things when we took this trip. All I knew was that the day I saw Mount McKinley, I wept. I didn't know why I wept--majesty, I presumed--but I wept. Since then I have come to a greater awe of those unfathomable depths stated so simply in Romans 1:20 as it is expressed in the larger world.
For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, [even] his eternal power and Godhead;