One hundred species of goldenrod even!
“Solidago” is the genus name of goldenrod, made up of Latin terms that could have meant to the original scientific classifier, “sun dagger.” I love these goldenrod days—for a variety of reasons: they typically herald the end of the uncomfortably hot days of summer, they mark the coming of fall with its anti-chlorophyll insurgence, and they’re just simply beautiful—especially when an entire field of goldenrod appears like a mirror to reflect the face of the sun.
KEY SCRIPTURE:
What a wildly wonderful world, God! You made it all, with Wisdom at your side, made earth overflow with your wonderful creations (Eugene Peterson’s paraphrase of one of my favorite verses about the Creator and His creation: Psalm 104:24 from The Message).
Spring wildflowers are subtle and quiet (excepting dandelions!), appearing mostly in the deep shade and often hidden to those who don’t actually walk in the woods. Fall wildflowers, on the other hand, are loud and brazen—revealing their glory even to speeding freeway travelers like a vast crowd of bridal attendants in brilliant silks, satins, and chiffons standing in rapt attention as the Preacher pronounces His blessing on the due process of life and procreation.
In the north, goldenrod is by far the most effusive fall wildflower, washing the country canvass with yellow upon which the Creator dabs purplish aster, white boneset,
and a variety of colors and sizes of fleabane, and the last of the daisies, Queen Anne’s lace, and black-eyed Susans.
The Canada goldenrod, the most common variety, is also the typical host of the goldenrod gall fly, a tiny insect that inserts its eggs into the flower stem. When the egg hatches, the larval fly begins to eat the plant material, its saliva causing the goldenrod to produce extra growth at the 
spot which sometimes grows to the size of golf ball: a gall. So in the winter many of the dead brown stalks sport this noticeable gall ball that downy woodpeckers and Carolina chickadees in particular see as an invitation to a meal—because the larva remains in the plant all winter long, its having the capacity to create an antifreeze that keeps it alive in subfreezing temperatures. A few times I collected several dozen of these galls to pluck out the larval fly, which is excellent ice-fishing bait for panfish. But I found most of them already emptied by other insect predators.
The joy of the outdoors for me is in discovering that every form of life is full of wonder, and much of that wonder still remains a mystery. Science may indeed provide us with many answers about the wonders of creation, but it is still baffled by the source and even the nature of life itself. And that brings us back to the psalmist: “[Your] knowledge is too wonderful for me, too lofty for me to attain” (139:6). We talk about the “information explosion” we’re experiencing. Can you imagine how blown away we would be if the divine genius that resides in the common goldenrod—a plant that comes in over a hundred different varieties—actually revealed all its knowledge to us? “Too wonderful” I’m sure would be my response.
God’s World
O WORLD, I cannot hold thee close enough!
Thy winds, thy wide grey skies!
Thy mists, that roll and rise!
Thy woods, this autumn day, that ache and sag
And all but cry with colour! That gaunt crag
To crush! To lift the lean of that black bluff!
World, World, I cannot get thee close enough!Long have I known a glory in it all,
But never knew I this;
Here such a passion is
As stretcheth me apart,—Lord, I do fear
Thou’st made the world too beautiful this year;
My soul is all but out of me,—let fall
No burning leaf; prithee, let no bird call.-Edna St. Vincent Millay (1892–1950). Renascence and Other Poems. 1917.
So long as the Church continues to teach the manhood of God and to celebrate the sacraments of [The Lord's Supper] and marriage, no living man should dare to say that matter and body are not sacred to her. She must insist strongly that the whole material universe is an expression and incarnation of the creative energy of God, as a book or a picture is a material expression of the creative soul of the artist. For that reason, all good and creative handling of the material universe is holy and beautiful. . . . The whole question of the right use to be made of art, of the intellect, and of the material resources of the world is bound up in this. Because of this, the exploitation of man or matter for commercial uses stands condemned, together with all debasement of the arts and perversions of the intellect. If matter and the physical nature of man are evil, or if they are of no importance except as they serve an economic system, then there is nothing to restrain us from abusing them as we choose—nothing, except the absolute certainty that such abuse will eventually come up against the unalterable law and issue in judgment and destruction.
In His sermon on the mount, Jesus plainly tells us that we cannot serve God and wealth (Mammon). Much of what we have been calling God’s blessing is little more than raw wealth. J. Budziszewski comments on capitalism devoid of Christian moral values in 
Citizenship is an obligation of the faith, therefore the Christian will not abstain from the politics of the nation-state. But his primary mode of politics must always be witness. It is a good and necessary thing to change the welfare laws, but better yet to go out and feed the poor. It is a good and necessary thing to ban abortion, but better yet to sustain young women and their babies by taking them into the fellowship of faith. This is the way the kingdom of God is built. It is not by the world that the world is moved—yet how it pulls. Ah, God, help us let go of the heights and the depths, the thrones and dominions, the powers and principalities; to be not conservatives, nor yet liberals, but simply Christians. “Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, says the Lord of Hosts.”
Our statements end with an affirmation of hope that was so aptly celebrated by Isaac Watts [photo] in his great hymn about the Second Advent of Jesus Christ and the eventual remediation of the consequences of the original spiritual rebellion: “Joy to the World” [Reread the lyrics 
This prehistoric revolt in the spiritual realm was carried over into the material realm by a sinful spirit who persuaded the first man and woman to disregard their Creator’s terms for the perpetuation of human life in harmony with His purposes. This disobedience resulted in the spiritual and eventual physical death of our first parents. It also had a negative effect on the rest of the creation. To remind the human family of its fallen condition, God added consequences to the human rebellion. Other judgments followed, many of which changed the nature of life on earth and distorted the original relationships.
Throughout the rest of the Bible, we read the record of our Creator’s loving pursuit of a lost and fallen humanity. This redemption theme runs throughout the Old and New Testaments and is fulfilled in the most inexpressible and miraculous act of intervention. The New Testament summarizes this redemptive rescue: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made. . . . He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, and the world did not know Him. He came to His own, and His own did not receive Him. But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name: who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth” (John 1:1-3,10-14).
Even though the Genesis creation account gives us only a fleeting foreshadow of God’s redemptive purposes, this prefiguration is the beginning of a great story that ends with the abode of God the Father and reign of God the Son on the earth as it is pictured in the final two chapters of the book of Revelation. The rest of the story assures us that the paradise lost by our human parents will be regained. The apostle Peter proclaimed: “Repent therefore and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, so that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord, and that He may send Jesus Christ, who was preached to you before, whom heaven must receive until the times of restoration of all things, which God has spoken by the mouth of all His holy prophets since the world began” (Acts 3:19-21; see also Isa. 11:6-9, Rom. 8:19-23, and Eph. 1:10).
If you know anything about bamboo you understand why I use the word “rogue” in reference to it. Once loose, it runs amok and muscles out virtually everything in its path—dead or alive! That’s why, of course, in its native habitat people have used it for an almost endless number of purposes—if for nothing more than keeping it from taking over. No doubt because of its ubiquity, bamboo has been an art theme for centuries. Because of my fascination with it, it has become one of my favorite photographic and art subjects. Bamboo is the topic of today’s “
By the design and loving intent of God, the astronomical features of the universe, as well as the oceans, land, and atmosphere of the earth were formed. The Creator progressively invested His genius in the formation of the elements, plants, and animals of the natural world and established their interdependencies. By His willful and purposeful plan, God created all life-forms and enabled each of them to reproduce “according to its kind” (Gen. 1:24).
After singing to the One who laid the foundations of the earth, the psalmist celebrated the sustaining work of the Creator when he wrote: “He sends the springs into the valleys; they flow among the hills. They give drink to every beast of the field; the wild donkeys quench their thirst. By them the birds of the heavens have their home; they sing among the branches. He waters the hills from His upper chambers; the earth is satisfied with the fruit of Your works. He causes the grass to grow for the cattle, and vegetation for the service of man, that he may bring forth food from the earth . . . . These all wait for You, that You may give them their food in due season. . . . You hide Your face, they are troubled; You take away their breath, they die and return to their dust. You send forth Your Spirit, they are created; and You renew the face of the earth” (Ps. 104:10-14,27,29-30). [See also 
To crown His creation, God used the nonliving matter of the earth to create a living man. Then, to provide man with a companion and complement that would assure the perpetuation of the race, He took living tissue from the man to create a woman [The first act of genetic engineering by the Chief Engineer!]. The Bible calls this original, morally accountable human pair Adam and Eve.
The result of God’s purposeful creation was a series of relationships that explain much about the meaning of human life. Not only did God create people, He entered into a personal relationship with them. In the beginning, He was in fellowship with Adam and Eve and walked with them in the Garden of Eden (Gen. 3:8). The relationship of God to the earth was ownership. The people of Israel declared their acceptance of this claim when they sang, “The earth is the Lord’s, and all its fullness, the world and those who dwell therein” (Ps. 24:1). The relationship of mankind to the earth was stewardship. From the first days of man’s life on earth, he understood that his responsibility was to care for the earth that his Maker entrusted to him: “The Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to tend and keep it” (Gen. 2:15).
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