Job 14:1-10

A mortal, born of woman, few of days and full of trouble,
comes up like a flower and withers,
flees like a shadow and does not last.
Do you fix your eyes on such a one?
Do you bring me into judgement with you?
Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean?
No one can.
Since their days are determined,
and the number of their months is known to you,
and you have appointed the bounds that they cannot pass,
look away from them, and desist,
that they may enjoy, like labourers, their days.

‘For there is hope for a tree,
if it is cut down, that it will sprout again,
and that its shoots will not cease.
Though its root grows old in the earth,
and its stump dies in the ground,
yet at the scent of water it will bud
and put forth branches like a young plant.
But mortals die, and are laid low;
humans expire, and where are they?

What I look forward to as the days get cooler is to truly enjoy a nice long hike in a park. Something about being surrounded by nature, the large oak trees and other fauna gives me a sense of peace but also a connection to God. Especially, as I visit parks like our Florida state parks where I know the nature that surrounds me has been here long before me and hopefully, after me as well. You see the growth of nature, with felled trees but also the saplings just beginning to root, to know that this diversity of nature is cared for and beloved by God as am I. I feel that care even more keenly when for but a moment, I am lost in those woods and I need to re-set my bearings, I am okay.

Are there places in your life that allows you to witness God’s presence? Have you? What needs to be paused in your life for that scared moment to happen?

Prayer

Creator God, as we are uniquely surrounded in this home of Florida by still life and beauty in what is the dead of winter for many others, may we be grateful for it. May we rejoice in such life and recognize it as a sign of hope for the future. May your work of salvation continue in and around us to be witnessed in such beauty. In Christ’s precious name, our only hope, Amen.