Beauty in the clouds

Have you paused for a moment lately to gaze up at the clouds? I think that in today's busy, on the go, way of life not many people stop to appreciate the natural world around them. Even in cities it is possible to pause and watch nature in the trees of your neighborhood, the birds, or the bugs. I was considering the beauty of the clouds last week and took these pictures. The pictures show the landscape of where I live and together with the clouds on that day it was beautiful. Unfortunately this is not my everyday view; I took these photos from a high point of my property. I wish I could see this out of my kitchen window each morning!

Have you ever thought about what a wonder the clouds are?I am not going to wax poetic about them but consider a cumulus cloud; they can be miles tall and the weight of them measures in the tons! I have read that the typical weight of a cumulus cloud can equal the weight of 100 elephants! But yet they float gracefully over our heads.

I love the book of Job. It has a lot of fascinating insights about the world around us. Also fascinating is that the book of Job may be the oldest writing in the Bible with the first 11 chapters of Genesis being the oldest. Some scholars estimate that the book of Job can be placed at around 2000 B.C. In Job 28:24-27 it is written,"For (God) looketh to the ends of the earth, and seeth under the whole heaven; to make the weight for the winds; and He weigheth the waters by measure. When he made a decree for the rain, and a way for the lightning of the thunder. Then He did see it, and declare it; He prepared it, yea, and stretched it out."

Here we see an Almighty God who creates the weather of the globe and sustains it all by His power.

Now it is not all that obvious to the physical senses that air and wind have weight. It was not scientifically confirmed until about 300 years ago. We know now from all of our studies of weather patterns that the global weights of air and water are in critical relationship to each other and produce our global weather patterns. The weight of the warm air rushing upwards from the earth helps buoy up the massive clouds that are formed by evaporation and transports them over the continents to drop their rain. God knows the balancing of the clouds (Job 37:16). In Job 26:8 it is written, "He bindeth up the waters in His thick clouds; and the cloud is not rent under them."

What neat insights into our world directly from the One who created it, given to us in His word!

So look up and wonder at the clouds!

Blessings!