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Adoration was neglected in my prayer life
for years. It was unnatural, ignored, and, at first, daunting.
Adore God? How? For what? You mean thank him?
No - Love Him! Appreciate Him for who he is!
How?
I cannot apprehend God in His totality. One time-honored method
of adoration is to appreciate God's creation. And I don't mean
via the opposite sex. :)
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Trees, for example, are part of God's creation. Each species
has a particular design, a DNA pattern for its growth and
identity. Some are geometric and angular, others are curvy
and random. Their architecture cooperates with their biology
and with physics for the purposes of life and procreation.
Their qi |
| bursts forth (wood energy) from a dormant seed,
stretching upwards willfully (zhi), standing strong in the
wind, sun, dryness, heat, storms, etc. They cannot run, so
they must endure. We can admire the beauty, strength, persistence,
solidity, and flexibility with which God endowed the tree. |
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And then, there are the tree-huggers. I know, most of them
are liberals and new-agers, but not all of them. The
last time I remember doing this was in the Redwoods of Northern
California. As laughable as it sounds, I confess: I felt moved
to do so by the magnificence of these exceptional works of
God. |
| If you've ever hugged a tree, you probably felt
a bit silly, but then you felt love, and a clear sense of
the immoveable, silent strength within. |
It's interesting to come at environmentalism from a Christian
perspective - we are called to be stewards, to take care of the
Earth. Our hyper-yang, consumptive modern lifestyle is upsetting
the complex balance of God's creation. Can we understand every
environmental complexity and the implication of every extinction
and clear-cutting? Perhaps not. Is nature so delicate? I don't
know. But we are called as Christians to find out, to be responsible
with what we have been entrusted.
Some links for more info:
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