Thursday, 2/27/20 – Discipleship – The Bible

Nature’s Signs

Look straight ahead. Now, making a fist extend your right arm straight forward. Align the thumb side of your extended fist before the center point of some fixed object in front of you. As you look at the back of the fist you have made the distance from its thumb side to its pinky side will be a fairly accurate 10°. If you change your fist to a “Y” shape by spanning thumb and pinky as far apart as you can the distance between thumb and pinky will be doubled to a fairly accurate 20°. Moving your arm two “Y” shaped lengths plus 1 three middle finger spans (see chart) to the right will result in your arm pointing 45° to the right of the center point from which you began.

Three middle finger spans = 5°. A pinky span = 1°. Nine fist spans = 90°. Eighteen “Y” spans = 360° and so on… You can use these “human sextant” tools to determine heights of trees, buildings or other objects, and by using triangulation even distances across rivers and such.

I learned all this from reading in a fascinating book called The Lost Art of Reading Nature’s Signs, by Australian writer and navigator Tristan Gooley.

God’s creation holds many secrets and speaks to us in many ways if we listen. In fact, scripture tells us that “God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made” (Rom. 1:20). Jesus Himself often pointed to creation in His parables explaining the Love and Nature of God the Father.

In the beginning God spoke… and created (Gen. 1). Some 2,000 years ago this same Word became flesh in the Person of Jesus Christ. Later the Word became text as holy men of God were inspired by the Spirit thereby creating the written Word of God, the Holy scriptures to guide us. Creation, Flesh, Book. But we must apply our ears and hearts, minds and spirit to grow. We must “have ears to hear,” as Jesus put it.

Dig into the Word of God today. As Peter writes, “desire the pure milk of the Word, that you may grow” (1 Pet. 2:2). Jesus Himself pleads, “learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart” (Matt. 11:29).

Press on…

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