Today was perfect for porch pondering. Just could not stay in the house on such a beautiful day. The sun was hot and raised the temperature to the high 70s. The sky was just glorious, winter blue filled with large fluffy clouds, colored in shades of gray and purple and bleached white where the sun kissed their rounded crowns. The cardinals and doves perched on the power lines, taking sun baths between trips to the bird feeders. February is National Bird Feeding Month, one of the hardest months for wild birds in North America.

I bathed Penelope this afternoon and placed her playpen in the sun so she could dry off in the warm sunshine. Kat jumped in the pen with her, wanting to get in the little dog bed, but Penelope beat her to the bed. Penelope didn’t want to nap in it, didn’t want to share it, so she just stood up in the bed till Kat lay herself down and went to sleep in the pen beside her. They tickle me how they treat each other.

This beautiful day ended wondrously, the color palette glorious. Mother Nature washed the horizon in a tropical island aqua blue, her brush strokes forming an ocean on the horizon. As the blue waves broke over the skyline, Mother Nature guided her paint brush of hot pink watercolors across the sky, the contrasting pink and blues quickly bleeding together into a dark grape purple. The evening’s gloaming had become a gift for my watchful eyes. Mattie Stepanakert writes, “Sunset is still my favorite color, and rainbow is second.” I agree with Mattie, I love the colors God places on Mother Nature’s watercolor palette at sunset.

We can learn a lot from Mother Nature. “Those who find beauty in all of nature will find themselves at one with the secrets of life itself,” L. Wolfe Gilbert. Nature shows us God’s power and majesty. Anyone who plants a garden learns patience and knows nature can’t be rushed, The corn tassels on its own schedule and the tomatoes can’t be rushed to their redness. “Nature does not hurry, yet everything is accomplished,” Lao Tzu. Ralph Waldo Emerson said, “Adopt the pace of nature. Her secret is patience.” Cultivating patience is a hard row to hoe.

Bible scripture says God created the thunder and lightning and wind. Psalm 19:1 reads, “The heavens declare the glory of God, and the expanse proclaims the work of his hands.” God places the sunset watercolor brushes in Mother Nature’s hands and shares his palette of glorious colors. We see God in all of nature, in his glorious creation of this planet.

Christianity says God is omnipresent (every where), omnipotent (all powerful) and omniscient (all knowing). We see these attributes through the beauty and complexity of nature. “The grass withers, the flowers fade, but the word of our God remains forever,” Isaiah 40:8.

“Those who contemplate the beauty of the earth find reserves of strength that will endure as long as life lasts.” — Rachel Carson