Significant Vapor. Magnificent Dust.

I look up to the heavens at night and realize I'm quite small, if not completely insignificant in this massive creation. I'm often reminded of this at church, school chapels, and my own astronomical gazings. I am fairly vaporish. Here today, I am. Tomorrow I will be gone. Vapor. Dust. Very small. I am very small. We are tiny. Like ants. We scurry. We work. We go with the flow. When one of us ventures off on our own we are either stepped on or commended for discovering something new. Little baby ants. We do not heed the ants. Why? Because we are mighty. We are strong. We are the masters. The ants probably have similar discussions amongst themselves. Something like "Those stupid, tiny parasites. They're so small and insignificant. We step on them!" It's all a matter of perspective. We tend to blind ourselves to what is greater than us unless we figure out a way to conquer it. To date, no one has devised a way to conquer God, though there has been at least one attempt. And that didn't end terribly well for the attempter. God is very big. God is very powerful. He is. This is my favorite sentence regarding God because it is so incredibly simple yet shows just how huge God really is. I could not say "John is." That's just silly. John was born, and John will die. That's about all I can do for myself. God, on the other hand, is. Is what? He is. He... is. God, this Being, was, is, and will be; He needs Himself and that is all.

But then He, He who simply is, decided to create the most spectacular work of art that has or will ever exist. And that is me. Yes, of course, the universe is more beautiful, magnificent, and incredible than I am. But what makes me the most spectacular is because I am made with pieces of Him sprinkled on top. He poured Himself into me. I am stained, besmirched, and broken, but to Him, still worth dying for. I was made in His image. And for me, for John Taylor, He became flesh, a form prone to sin, failure, and death, and conquered all three. For me. He did not sin like I do. He did not fail, though, for three days, many thought He had. But He did die, like I will. However, God, rather, the Son of God, who is God, who also is, declared victory over death by returning to life. And this life He offers to me. To us. To all who accept this as truth. We are magnificent. But we are only vapor. It's a strange, terrifyingly great concept.

Before ripping these mushrooms from the ground (why? because I'm bigger than they are), I ran and got my digital Nikon D70. The lighting was too perfect not to shoot something that day. I took a few pictures but realized I was not close enough. I wanted to see much more of the little umbrellas. So I knelt, and then lay down on the grass. The mushrooms were about an inch from the glass and my eye not much further from the view finder. However, a similar feeling came over me as I looked at the little ant umbrella, the same feeling I get when gazing into space. It's almost eerie to see such detail on something so small. Not only did God busy Himself with the stars in the sky but He also took His time on these tiny mushrooms. And how much greater, I thought, am I to Him than these tiny ant furnishings? Once again, feeling very small but very important, I smiled and focused on the little fungi. I waited as an ant meandered across my lens and, then, when it had taken to a blade of grass, pressed gently on that little silver button. God did a good job on these mushrooms, I think.