The mercury is dipping to extreme lows these days.
And the days are still on the short side. Even as we look at the forecast on our phones, even as the days lengthen by minutes, the lengthening of the sunshine in the sky seems to proceed all too slowly.
Indeed, sunrise still isn’t happening until well after 7:30 a.m., but sunset is happening after 5 p.m. Today, the mobile weather app says the sun will go down at 5:15 p.m.! That’s quite an improvement over a couple of weeks ago.
As the ground is covered in snow, it reflects the sunshine and encourages us to look up.
Winter skies can be grey but they can be incredibly blue or full of colours – oranges, pinks, purples.
The silhouettes of trees are beautiful. Whether the trees are evergreens or whether they have bare deciduous branches reaching up, they remind us of the beauty and variety of creation. Each type of branch has its own beauty with snow sprinkled on it or bare against the sky.
“The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands,” David says in Psalm 19.
Even when we are in the shadows, we are still under God’s care.
The law of the Lord revives the soul, the psalmist adds, later in verse 7.
The joy of the joy of the Lord is ours, because we are His.
Join us online and hear more about the joy of the Lord in this week’s worship now online https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S_tEdfXqQF0