Invitation to Joy

Praise is due to you, O God, in Zion, and to you shall vows be performed. O you who hear prayer, to you shall all flesh come. When iniquities prevail against me, you atone for our transgressions. Blessed is the one you choose and bring near, to dwell in your courts! We shall be satisfied with the goodness of your house, the holiness of your temple! By awesome deeds you answer us with righteousness, O God of our salvation, the hope of all the ends of the earth and of the farthest seas; the one who by his strength established the mountains, being girded with might; who stills the roaring of the seas, the roaring of their waves, the tumult of the peoples, so that those who dwell at the ends of the earth are in awe at your signs. You make the going out of the morning and the evening to shout for joy. You visit the earth and water it; you greatly enrich it; the river of God is full of water; you provide their grain, for so you have prepared it. You water its furrows abundantly, settling its ridges, softening it with showers, and blessing its growth. You crown the year with your bounty; your wagon tracks overflow with abundance. The pastures of the wilderness overflow, the hills gird themselves with joy, the meadows clothe themselves with flocks, the valleys deck themselves with grain, they shout and sing together for joy. (Psalm 65 ESV). Every August, when the skies are the darkest, the best-known meteor shower makes its appearance. The annual Perseid meteor shower is now in full sight! There are many legends that have grown up around the celestial sight. Laurentius, a Christian deacon, is said to have been martyred by the Romans in AD 258 on an iron outdoor stove. It was in the midst of this torture that Laurentius supposedly cried out: “I am already roasted on one side and, if thou wouldst have me well cooked, it is time to turn me on the other.” It is highly doubtful whether this actually happened or was a product of morbid medieval imagination, but King Philip II of Spain believed it enough to build his monastery place, the “Escorial,” on the site of his death, which is commemorated on August 10th. The abundance of shooting stars seen annually between approximately August 8th and 14th came to be known by some as “St. Lawrence’s fiery tears.” Of course, we know that the meteor shower is the dross of the comet Swift-Tuttle. The more I began to think about the heavenly sight; I was reminded of all the beauty that the Lord has surrounded us with! Like the psalmist, it is easy to see God’s inspiration to joy! The American Astronomical Society, meeting in Arlington, Virginia is intrigued by evidence of some kind of a "great attractor", an immense gravitational magnet, pulling powerfully at our Milky Way and at more than a hundred other galaxies. It is causing a dramatic distortion in the all expansion of the universe. It is tugging at galaxies from across more than a hundred million light years of space, pulling them toward a lump of something, something very dense, for which the scientists have no name except "The Great Attractor". Until now accepted theory has been that the universe is expanding. Now there is evidence it is falling inward toward "The Great Attractor." Let Him pull you closer than ever before today! Rejoice in His beautiful works!