It was cool that early morning as I sat in the dark on the rim of the Grand Canyon in Arizona. I had no idea about what I was about to actually experience. I had seen the pictures, the paintings, and the films representing the thing that lay out there before me in the darkness. The dark, merging shapes dimly lit by the moonless sky was actually pretty amazing in itself because the darkness of the depths before me was domed by the greatness of the galaxy above as it seemed that you could see all the stars of the heavens in that moment. A subject for another time.
I was there to see the massive chasm of rock but what happened over the next couple of hours was something that is very difficult to explain. The physical things that started happening around me as the warm glow in the eastern sky became stronger is fairly easy to describe. My surroundings became shades of gray that eventually gave way to dazzling color as the world around me became revealed in the light of day. But there are no words to describe the sensation that seemed to want to press into my very flesh as I sat there in the hush of the dawn and experience the wonder of a moment that seems to be just beyond what we might consider real.
The whole idea of wonder is just too big to write about on a single page but the thing I want to inspire is the idea of making a practice of being so taken by something that we have to stop everything else and experience one of God's greatest gifts to the human experience, the sense of wonder. It doesn't have to be a sunrise on the rim of the Grand Canyon in Arizona although I hope everyone gets a chance to be there. What about the butterfly floating by, apparently without much effort? How about the singing of the birds in the early morning bringing in the light of a new day? Each bringing a different note, a different rhythm.
The thing about wonder is that it is always out there waiting. Waiting for someone to detach from the cold, tepid life of facts and futile attempts to make things make sense. Wonder settles in when there is a pause so that quiet and color can become things that are felt more than they are sensed through the eyes and ears. I will always seek to wonder...