.png)
You may listen to this devotion in audio form via podcast here.
Psalm 19:1-6 The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands. Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they reveal knowledge. - Psalm 19:1-2 I was born and lived the first 10 years of my life in Honduras, where my parents were missionaries. For much of that my family lived in the small town of Catacamas, which my mom liked to say was ‘out in the boondocks.’ The next nearest English speaker was a 4-hour drive away, and that was if you could ford the rivers, because there were no bridges. As you might imagine, this made life rather lonely for my parents. So my dad studied and acquired his HAM Radio license. His call sign was N8BXK, funny how I’ll never forget that. HAM Radio uses a short wave frequency, and we could use it to call other HAM Radios in the US or Canada where our family lived. We had a 30-foot antenna sprouting from our house’s roof to catch and receive messages. The strange thing about the HAM Radio is sometimes the signal was clear as day. We would talk with my grandparents on the other end all the way in Canada, and it was like they were in the next room. But, more often than not, the signal was weak. Static would burst over the speakers, and we could barely hear our family members. The static could be caused by any variety of things in the atmosphere. It could be too much cloud cover, or a storm system between us and those we were calling. Even solar flares could disrupt the frequency. Those calls would be incredibly frustrating as we strained to hear and make out the words of our relatives through all that white noise. It strikes me that listening to God can seem so much like that. God is constantly sending out a signal. Yet something interferes with God’s signal and our ability to hear him. Sometimes there is a problem in the atmosphere, the spiritual atmosphere. It has a name. Sin is like static that covers up what God is saying to us. The signal is there, if we listen. The heavens declare it. The skies proclaim it. Day after day they pour fourth speech that comes from God Himself. Night after night, knowledge of God is displayed. God’s voice goes into all the earth. And we hear bits and pieces. We try to eliminate the static, but can’t. It’s so frustrating. God’s voice is all around us. During the day His voice calls to us—the wind in the leaves, the rising and setting of the sun, the fall colors around us, the grace of the deer we hunt, even the mice we catch in our traps, the sunshine of the day, the stars, the moon, the early morning frost, the refreshing coolness, the people who surround us. They all talk to us about what God wants us to know about Him. When I’m stressed and feel that God is so distant—the only thing my spiritual HAM Radio is picking up is static—sometimes the signal that finally comes through clear is a view of the snow-capped mountains against a bright blue sky. And the words of this Psalm come to mind, “The heavens declare the glory of God.” Then I often remember one of my dad’s favorite songs: This is my Father’s world, and to my listening ears All nature sings, and round me rings the music of the spheres. This is my Father’s world; I rest me in the thought Of rocks and trees, of skies and seas —
His hand the wonders wrought. This is my Father’s world: The birds their carols raise, The morning light, the lily white, declare their Maker’s praise. This is my Father’s world: He shines in all that’s fair; In the rustling grass I hear Him pass;
He speaks to me everywhere. This is my Father’s world: O let me ne’er forget That though the wrong seems oft so strong, God is the ruler yet. This is my Father’s world: Why should my heart be sad? The Lord is King, let the heavens ring!
God reigns; let the earth be glad.