Do You Have Any Mountains That Need Moving?
I grew up singing “How Great Thou Art” by English hymnist Stuart Hine. The song had not been printed in our hymnals, Christian Hymns II, so we sang it from sheet music glued to the inside covers.
As a child, when we got to the line about “lofty mountain grandeur,” I thought about scenes from the Smoky Mountains, one of the places Daddy and Mother took us when Daddy got his yearly three and a half day vacation. I enjoyed those drives up to Clingman’s Dome and then over to Cherokee, North Carolina. It was thrilling to drive through the tunnels and especially exciting to stop when we spotted a black bear alongside the road.
One time when Ray and I were driving home from the Christian Homeschool Association of Pennsylvania convention, we got off I-81 for a while and drove on the Blue Ridge Parkway.
We stopped often to photograph the “lofty mountain grandeur” there and we even heard “birds sing sweetly in the trees.”
The parkway follows the Blue Ridge. A beautiful view of a valley beneath mountains can be seen from every scenic overlook, whether the overlook faces to the east of the road or to the west.
Here are some sample photos with accompanying verses from a beautiful creation chapter, Psalm 104.
The mountains rose; the valleys sank down
To the place which You established for them.
Psalm 104:8
He sends forth springs in the valleys;
They flow between the mountains;
They give drink to every beast of the field;
The wild donkeys quench their thirst.
Psalm 104:10-11
Beside them the birds of the heavens dwell;
They lift up their voices among the branches.
Psalm 104:12
He waters the mountains from His upper chambers;
The earth is satisfied with the fruit of His works.
Psalm 104:13
He causes the grass to grow for the cattle,
And vegetation for the labor of man,
So that he may bring forth food from the earth.
Psalm 104:14
The trees of the Lord drink their fill.
Psalm 104:16a
He made the moon for the seasons;
The sun knows the place of its setting.
You appoint darkness and it becomes night,
In which all the beasts of the forest prowl about.
Psalm 104:19-20
Do you have any mountains that need moving? Trust the God of all creation.
If you have faith the size of a mustard seed,
you will say to this mountain,
“Move from here to there,”
and it will move;
and nothing will be impossible to you.
Matthew 17:20