When we travelled two years ago to the USA for a friend’s wedding, our favourite place was not Las Vegas, where her wedding was. It wasn’t the beautiful Californian coast or even the stunning Zion national park.
It was a place in the middle of nowhere.
We were driving somewhere between Zion and the north rim of the Grand Canyon and we just had to pull over. Never had we seen anything like this, the sky like a massive dome over us, unbroken by trees or mountains or towns.
Just big wide open sky.
It took our breath away and we would tell anyone who would listen when we got home about this place where the horizon seemed a million miles away and there was just nothing but sky sky sky.
There’s a verse in the bible that is very popular but I always get inwardly annoyed whenever I hear someone read it out because invariably they read it too fast and it comes out something like this: And I pray that you may grasp howwidenadlongandhighanddeep is the love of Christ.
And I want to scream, no! It’s not like that! It’s like this:
And I pray that you may grasp…
how
WIDE
and
LONG
and
HIGH
and
DEEP
is the love of Christ.
Wide like the sky in northern Arizona.
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Each Friday, Lisa-Jo, the Gypsy Mama, invites us to write for five minutes. No stopping, no editing. Just write. Click over there for her five minute Friday prompt.
{ 12 comments… read them below or add one }
Hi! Found you at gypsy mama. I just had to comment because I was born in NM and lived in AZ, too. There is nothing quite like the Arizona sky — it is HUGE. In NM, right next door, the clouds are the big to-do — the clouds over the mesas and the NM high desert are ever-changing and interesting, but the sky in Arizona is immense. I love that you likened that big blue space to the amazing verse that tries to describe in human terms the vastness of God’s love. Cool.
Alyssa, now you’ve got me adding NM to my “to visit” list, just for the clouds
Love that there’s so much variety and beauty in the world to discover!
I loved reading this post! So glad to have found you through 5 minute Friday!
I love to read that passage slowly too
Thank you! I’m discovering there’s a lot more to notice when I just slow down a little…
i grew up in the wide open expanse like that… and we don’t have to drive far out of the city where we live now to be in a similar environment. i love to lay on top of one of the huge sand dunes and just watch the sky – how it goes on forever. (i love the wind, too… but that is another story!)
appreciated your 5 minute write today.
Thank you Richelle. The sand dunes sound amazing! There’s so much enjoyment to be received in nature
Ohhh beautiful, wonderful words. That area where you took the photo and described – is sooo on our dream list to visit! One day…one day. Thank you for sharing. Love that verse too…..
Another Fiona! Hi! Thanks for being here today
We just drove through that area this summer. I was mesmerized… It was perhaps the most beautiful place I have seen in my country! I felt like it was as if every mountain, every canyon let us pass through, silently reminding us that the universe is large and we are small, that we hold but a moment of space in time, and that there was a reality much larger and deeper than the transition of our current moments. It felt good to be small, to shrink into the vastness and to remember that my role was simply to pay attention to what God creates, not orchestrate it.
“it felt good to be small”. YES. This is so often my experience when I have the time to be out in nature, the privilege it is to be part of it, to be allowed to exist in this crazy beautiful world. I love the way you have with words.
Oh, I know that sky well!! I was born and raised in Arizona, now living in Ireland. It is such an amazing example of God’s vast, expansive love! Thanks for sharing, and for bringing a little bit of “home” to my screen today!
And Ireland is a different kind of wild sky – a little more grey and wet perhaps
Thanks for visiting Jennifer!