Radiant Reflections

As most of you know, Spain is gorgeous. (Yes dad, Iowa is also beautiful, but in it's own special way.) While immersed in the beauty of Spain I have nearly been blinded by the radiant reflection of God all around me. In Spain it is extremely difficult not to see the reflection/beauty/fingerprint of God all around.

Standing on a fortress tower at the Alhambra I gazed down on the city of Granada lying below in peace and tranquility while the Sierra mountains capped in dazzling white stole my breath from above, the sun shone down upon me and the other tourists from Spain, France, Portugal, Brazil, China, and who knows where else. For a moment it seemed as though heaven descended to earth and everything was right and good, good like the beginning.

From the top of the Rock of Gibraltar on a blue-sky day God’s beauty is anything but absent. Morocco lies across the straight, the mountains of Southern Spain shoot from the water to the West, to the East ripples the open Mediterranean, below the crowded city with winding streets parallels cargos ships resting in the still blue of the harbor, and all around me, often mere inches away, are monkeys, monkeys that seem to arouse childlike jubilee from every person visiting this magical place.

As I walk through the doorway of an old palace the gardens of the Alcazar force an unintentional ‘wow’ from my lips. The sun is high, causing the full colors of the Alcazar to explode from inside the palace walls. Ducks flap, dive, and paddle around in the fountains that overflow into peaceful ponds. A maze of shrubs causes children to giggle, blossoming trees create an elegant background for couples posing for their wedding photos, towering evergreens and palm trees provide cool shade for a woman wrapped up in a gripping novel, and lemon trees throw me back into the feeling I first had when everything in Spain was exotic and new.

But God doesn’t only reveal Himself in the ‘wow’ moments. The joy of 85 year old Jose when he wins Bingo Tuesday afternoon, the reflection of an illuminated Trianna bridge off the still river water, the giggles of two little girls playing in the park, my professor Salva learning and using the term ‘fergalicious’, eating pizza with corn on it with 10 friends, the thanks and joy of a homeless woman named Luna when we share a meal with her, playing soccer with 7 Americans and 3 Frenchmen in Spain, watching flamenco at a local bar, an email from a friend, and many more. The beauty, love, and grace of God is inescapable, His reflection in the world is dazzling. I hope that you also are experiencing this wherever you. Open your eyes and watch God transform the ‘ordinary’ into extraordinary. Isn’t it beautiful?