Wonder Fatigue

The past two days took us across Wyoming, through Yellowstone and the Grant Tetons, and into Montana.  The scenery has been spectacular and the contrasts are amazing.  We went from desolate to lush, flat to mountainous, from shear rock cliffs to tree-covered vistas.  You couldn’t buy a tree in most of Wyoming, while Yellowstone is populated with wonderful Ponderosa pines, whose verticality is peculiar (but beautiful) to my East Coast eyes.  In Yellowstone we also saw bubbling pools, hot oozing mud, geysers, steam beds, rivers and waterfalls, and everywhere mountains – smooth and jagged, small(ish) and massive.  Don’t like the scenery?  Wait a second: it’s bound to change.

All this eye candy has been such a treat, but I worried that I might become dulled to its beauty.  Can you get used these magnificent mountains, beautiful rivers, and gasp-inducing views everywhere?  Do you reach a point where you fail to see them anymore?  Is there such a thing as ‘wonder fatigue’?

I think the same question applies to those of us who live in Northern Virginia.  My daily commute for the past year took me down the GW Parkway past the Lincoln, Washington, and Jefferson Monuments, views of the Capitol dome, the Pentagon, and Arlington Cemetery.  Fortunately, those never cease to induce awe for me.  But I know it’s easy enough to forget how lucky we are to live near such a special city, and that most of the people out here (for whom these mountains might or might not be invisible) may never see those sights many of us take for granted. 

Paul started this blog out over a month ago by answering the “big questions”: the who/what/why/when/how questions.  I deferred on the “Why?” at the time, because a month ago all I could think about was getting away from the crazy for a month and clearing my mind before my life moved into it’s next exciting stage.  The past 2,500 miles have given me a few opportunities (!) to think more about why this trip is so important to me now.  Paul and I were talking the other day and he pointed out that part of it is patriotic – to appreciate the purple mountains’ majesty and fruited plains it helps to have seen them (though it’s clearly not a requirement).  Agreed.  And wow!  Talk about majestic.

I still don’t have a concise answer, but the past few days have taught me a lot about humility.  Humility first in the presence of God’s magnificent creation – to see this is to scratch the surface of His extraordinary power and His love.  You can’t look at all of this, not just the beauty, and not even just the size of it, but the variety – the ‘all’ of it – and not see an Awesome God.  And in that moment, I challenge you not to be humbled.

For me, a similar sense of smallness, blessedness, and humility accompanies my upcoming consecrated commitment.  I am amazed and overwhelmed that God is calling me – me! – to serve Him in such an incredible way.  I can’t do it, not on my own, anyway.  Only through Him is any of this possible.  That call humbles me.  I know this isn’t something I just dreamed up; I joke about this being my mid-life crisis – my convertible – but I know it is something much more than that.

And so, driving along the Gallatin River this morning, watching the steam rise off the water as it ran down the mountain (trust me: rivers in Montana run, there’s no meandering around here), seeing the mountains cloaked in fog yet sparkling in the golden glow of the early sun, and enjoying each new view as it takes my breath away again, I am humbled.  I am thankful.  I am amazed.  God is good!