Reading about nature is fine. But if a person walks in the woods and listens carefully, he can learn more than what is in books, for they speak with the very voice of God. I love to think of nature as an unlimited broadcasting station, through which God speaks to us every hour if we will only tune in.
We are here to witness the creation and to abet it. We are here to notice each thing so each thing gets noticed. Together we notice not only each mountain shadow and each stone on the beach but, especially, we notice the beautiful faces and complex natures of each other.… Otherwise, creation would be playing to an empty house.
The tree in the field is to be treated with respect. It is not to be romanticized as the old lady romanticizes her cat (that is, she reads human reactions into it). . . . But while we should not romanticize the tree, we must realize that God made it and it deserves respect because he made it as a tree. Christians who do not believe in the complete evolutionary scale have reason to respect nature as the total evolutionist never can, because we believe that God made these things specifically in their own areas. So if we are going to argue against evolutionists intellectually, we should show the results of our beliefs in our attitudes. The Christian is a man who has a reason for dealing with each created thing on a high level of respect.
Nature never taught me that there exists a God of glory and of infinite majesty. I had to learn that in other ways. But nature gave the word glory a meaning for me.
I can’t understand what must be in a man’s mind if he doesn’t feel seriously that there is a God when he sees the sun rise. It must at times occur to him that there are eternal things, or else he must push his face into the dirt like a sow. For it’s incredible that they [the planets] be observed to move without inquiring whether there isn’t somebody who moves them.
Seeing the grandeur of the mountains or the power and expanse of the ocean, it’s not hard to see how people throughout history have found themselves worshipping various aspects of nature. The psalmist was right to direct our attention beyond the mountains to the ultimate source, the Creator God. How fabulous that the Maker of the Mountains is also so personal in His love, so complete in His care!
Our Lord has written the promise of the resurrection, not in books alone but in every leaf in springtime.
Nature is our sister, not our mother; she too has fallen.