The Morning Came And There Was God

                             Seen By A Blind Man

                               By Phil Scovell


     August 22, 2007



          It was  8 o'clock but it  felt like six.   I opened the  door and
     step from the livingroom  out on to our deck.  Carrying my 5 month old
     grandson, I walked to the deck swing and  sat down.  It was passed mid
     August and normally, at this hour  of the morning, the rising sun  was
     so  bright, it felt  tangible and nearly  knocked you down.   This day
     started out cloudy.

          As I held  my grandson, who likes  the deck swing as much  as his
     grandpa, I stood him upright  so he could stretch his legs.   He stood
     on my right leg  and pumped his legs up  and down like little  pistons
     and I kidded  him that he was already  running in place.   The air was
     heavy and mountain  cool.   I thought  it might be  possible it  would
     rain, or at least sprinkle, but I  felt nothing yet.  My almost 4 year
     old grandson came out on the deck and said, "E-pa," he  hasn't learned
     grandpa yet  so his grandmother is  E-ma and I  am E-pa and I  have no
     idea where he  got these names  but it works, "Hi  E-pa," he said.   I
     answer him and he said, "The sun isn't out yet, E-pa."

          "Nope," I said.  "It's cloudy this morning, isn't it."  It wasn't
     a question.

          "Yep," he  said and began  playing with some  of his toys  on the
     deck.

          I continued talking to my younger grandson has I held him upright
     and  he ran in  place.   I asked  him if he  were dancing,  running in
     place, or just  practicing for  the day  he would walk  for the  first
     time.   I  heard the  engines of  a commercial  jet  sliding down  its
     invisible glide  slope toward  Denver International airport.   It  was
     still very high and its muted sounds  of winding down engines had just
     suddenly appeared over head  and behind me as it cross  from southwest
     to northeast.  "Hey, Lee.  Can you see that airplane?" I asked.

          Elijah said, "Nope.  It is in the clouds.  I can't see him E-pa."

          Up until  that point, I  wasn't sure  how low the  cloud covering
     might  have been  because the  sun  would have  normally already  been
     fairly high  and I  wasn't feeling  any sunlight  at all  on my  face.
     "Yep,"I saidto my almost4 yearold grandson,"he's inthe cloudsI guess."

          "Yep," Elijah replied as he returned to playing on the deck.

          Baby Everett was still running on  my right leg as I held  him up
     as my ears continued surveying  my surroundings.  I loved  hearing the
     planes coming in  and going  out and especially  the fast movers,  the
     fighter jets, as they tilted skyward and passed up and over the nearby
     mountains;  the backwash of  the jet engines loud  as they bounced off
     the rock faces.

          "E-pa," I heard my almost 4 year old grandson say, "the  sun just
     came out."

          "It did?"  I questioned.   "I don't feel  it yet," but just  as I
     said it, I vaguely felt the ambience of the air shift as the sun began
     burning through the morning cloud covering.

          I was  still listening  for other aircraft  coming and  going but
     heard none.  No fast movers today, I thought.  Then I heard it.  I was
     facing  straight north in the swing.  The sound was east and south, to
     my right and behind  me but way off in the distance;  I mean, way off.
     It was a perfect thunderclap.  I sat in awe  at the beautiful sound as
     it  expanded like a bubble.   It had  been miles away  but the thunder
     formed  and  shaped  and rolled  through  the  density of  mountainous
     morning air as it unfolded in  every direction.  I heard the  backwash
     of the thunder and as  I listened carefully, it seemed as if the sound
     bounced  and ricocheted  and bumped around  in the clouds  like a huge
     rubber ball.   The towering Rocky Mountains  to my left help  trap the
     clear sounds  in the  valley.   Being miles  behind the  phenomenon, I
     could hear every element of its wave form as it curled and  rolled and
     morphed into ever expanding sound profiles across the valley below me.
     My almost 4 year old grandson said, "E-pa.  I hear thunder."

          "Me,  too," I  said;  still listening  to  the beautiful  morning
     sound.  Ten seconds passed and I  could still hear a small part of the
     thunderclap far east of where I sat.  I wondered  just how far away it
     was now.  There  were no other thunderclaps so this one  I was able to
     capture  totally and  catch every  unique sound  of  its design  as it
     rolled across the city below.

          It was morning.

          As  my mind  focused  on what  I  had just  witnessed  between my
     grandchildren's  little voices, the  gliding jet, the  faint sounds of
     cars on their way to work, and the thunder,  I said quietly to myself,
     "Lord, if I could have only seen it."

          The baby was  now done running  on my right  leg and was  getting
     fussy.  I stood  and carried him into the house; the  soft rays of the
     Colorado morning sunlight  now touching my back with  its still gentle
     warmth as the  thick clouds filtered it.   I couldn't see  the sunrise
     any more, at least  not yet, but I  did witness it  in all of its  God
     splendor.  Don't bother telling me there is  no God.  I didn't see Him
     this morning but I did hear Him.


     Safe Place Fellowship
     Phil Scovell
     Denver, Colorado
     Mountain Time Zone
     Phone:  303-507-5175
     WWW.SafePlaceFellowship.COM

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