Writing Off Sunsets

The last few weeks I have become enamored with taking pictures especially of the sunsets.  In the moments I am driving around taking pictures of God's glory, I understand what David meant in Psalm 23 when he says, "He restores my soul." Surrounded by His beauty I find peace and joy, and a thankful spirit, something that I sometimes lose in the midst of the busyness that I call my life.

The last several nights I have lost the sunsets to the clouds. The evenings are still beautiful, but that big ball of fire has been hidden by the clouds some time before it drops below the horizon. I thought tonight was no different. I saw the sun sinking behind the clouds, so I wrote off the sunset and went inside. I was sitting at my computer when I looked up and saw a pink and orange glow out of the corner of my window. I grabbed my camera and ran out the door.

The pictures really do not do it justice. I have yet to be able to capture the true color of the sun in those moments on my camera. I may not have been able to capture it, but I got to experience it. I drove down a dirt road trying to get the remaining bits of the sun before it disappeared.

And then I watched some birds playing over the water, thinking if I had brought a different lens, I could zoom in on them.

When I went home and was looking back through the pictures, I realized that I often "write off the sunsets" so to speak. Sometimes I look at a situation and think that the best has come. I forget that though I am limited by what I know, God does not have those same limitations. When I see something and think, "This is as good as it is going to get", God has the ability to make the next moments even more beautiful. He also has the ability to help us see them, even when we think we have seen it all.

These are the learning moments. The faith building moments. The moments where we can sit and feel guilty because we almost missed it. Or the moments we can praise God because we didn't. They can be simple and sometimes even profound. If we let them, they will give us strength for the next moment that comes along when we are tempted to write off what we can not see and remind us of the One who sees all.

"He leads me beside quiet waters. He restores my soul;"
Psalm 23:2b-3a (NASB)