It snowed.  7 inches worth up here; that is a significant amount, especially for us.  It is a pretty dry snow, but still a hazard on the streets for those unprepared.  And as the day warms up it melts a bit and becomes slicker – and heavier to shovel.

I like(d) snow, one of the benefits of working Graveyard shift, patrolling the city, was the driving through fresh fallen snow where no one had yet driven.  It was like discovering new territories and being the only one in the world. 

The blanket of snow made sounds muffled and those early morning hours when only you were out were refreshing, like a renewing of spirit – that was until the going to work time by others, investigating accidents in sub-freezing weather and keeping other drives from hitting the cars or me. 

I remember one young lady who crashed.  She said her father was going to kill her.  I looked at her bald tires and told her that she shouldn’t have been driving on them, her dad shouldn’t have let her drive to school – not sure who was at fault here, she may have been told NOT to drive sometimes kids don’t listen........

While I like snow, I don’t like having to shovel it.  One of the nice things of being up here is the solitude, the quite feel you are out in the country.  Even though there are houses and neighbors close by, there is enough openness that makes you feel up are out in the country.   – draw backs are there is a LOT of snow to shovel, we are on the west side of the hill so the sun doesn’t shine on it and it lasts a LOT longer.  Wasn’t so bad when Steven was here, but that was a few years ago, and I am a bit older with a bum shoulder, we will survive – not ready to cry uncle yet!

Carla will be driving the ‘Wasco County Sheriff’s family’ pickup to work the next few days.  It has four wheel drive and good tires.  I was going to get the studs put on the Toyota this week, but it is a bit too late now.  Can’t get it down the hill and the tire shops are full right now anyway.  We can wait a few days.  Art :-)

Genesis 1:26-27 And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.

²⁷ So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.

Genesis 2:7 And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.

and man became a living soul.    Now, THAT is exciting!!!! 

God created all things, but He took special interest in His creation of man.  While He created the universe and everything else that was in it with His Voice, He formed man with His hands.  He made man in His image.  He breathed life into Him.

When we look at the intricacies of everything made we see incredible precision, incredible workmanship.  Everything fits together to form the created item.  Extremely small items – atoms and molecules that are similar but different come together to form larger items – cells which come together to form even larger items, and so the creation goes on, different for each thing, but similar in as much as He creates from a master design; HIS design.

I can remember as a child taking the back off my watch to watch the inner workings.  A classmate who sat next to me would do the same thing; we were enthralled by its complexity.  One of our classmates complained to the teacher because we were always doing this – not sure why he was complaining, just remembered he did.  The teacher just said something like:  maybe they will be watch makers when they grow up.

Dexterity of a watch maker was a gift I was never given.  I did not become a watch maker, indeed anything requiring fine motor skills escapes my ability and I have to rely on those that have that gift to produce the things I might need.  But it has never prevented me from appreciating those gifts.  How they can form small things like the wheels of those watches and make them into something that works. 

I realize that much is done by machine and robots now – but man created those, so his creative mind, to see the need, to understand how to make them and then to make those shows man’s creativity is still there.  But it is the products where a man has sat down and made it by hand, with pride and care, have always intrigued me.

Some people can create something from the very base articles and complete it without having to put it on paper.  Most need a blue print or a pattern to follow to make sure everything fits together, the more detailed the item the more likely hood of a detailed plan.  But it doesn’t come together by itself; it is created, first in the mind, then in reality by the person(s) creating it.

No matter which creation of God, the parts making up the whole are so small we cannot see most of them with our naked eye.  Man is developing instruments all the time that show smaller and smaller parts within those small parts.  Even the ‘simple’ cell that many of us were told, in our education programs, had not means of thinking etc., have turned out to have an incredible complex circuitry within.

Man was and is special to God.  Above all that He created He placed man.  It is man that He has endowed with a spirit (He brought Him to life with HIS breath,) it is man whom He expects to follow after Him.  He doesn’t require subservience, worship or recognition from any other thing He has created in the physical universe that He requires from man.

Within man He placed a desire to worship Him.  Satan is aware of that longing within the heart and has used it to help man fall away from God.

Man has often turned that longing into a search for something, either calling it a god, or it becomes his god - something he can control or at least has the same ‘moral values’ he has.  Many feel the unfulfilled soul crying out for God and go looking for that god that meets their idea of the ideal – and satan is there to help him.

But a manmade god means nothing, can do nothing and, in the end, the worship of it will destroy him.  

God is God; He has made it clear that He will not change, that we must come to Him as He has instructed.  He wants to once again have a one on one communication with man AND He will accept man through His Son’s sacrifice. 

Malachi 3:5-7  And I will come near to you to judgment; and I will be a swift witness against the sorcerers, and against the adulterers, and against false swearers, and against those that oppress the hireling in his wages, the widow, and the fatherless, and that turn aside the stranger from his right, and fear not me, saith the Lord of hosts.

⁶ For I am the Lord, I change not; therefore ye sons of Jacob are not consumed.

⁷ Even from the days of your fathers ye are gone away from mine ordinances, and have not kept them. Return unto me, and I will return unto you, saith the Lord of hosts. 

God hasn’t forgotten man, He still wants to bring him to Himself.  He wants him to learn about and accept His Son as Savior.  God wants to bring man home.

Ephesians 2:10  For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.

He doesn’t leave us longing.  He doesn’t leave us isolated and alone.  He continues His working in and to us.  Man is His special creation and even though we have failed Him many times through the thousands of years since Creation, He wants to bring us back into that perfection that Adam once had, and Jesus does have. 

Later Art :-)

From the ColumbiaRiverGorgeous
May Our Good Lord Bless and Keep YOU....’til we meet again