I remember being a skywatcher from an early age.  As kiddos, my brothers and I usually spent a couple of hot, dusty weeks every summer at my grandparents' house in a tiny West Texas town.  To secure a couple of hours without little people in her business, my granny would occasionally toss us a blanket and tell us to go outside and watch the clouds.  We would lie on our backs as the afternoon breeze blew fluffy white cotton balls across the sky.  With dry grass poking through the quilt into our tender backs, we would imagine all kinds of shapes and characters -- horses, ice cream cones, bunnies, bald heads on old men, hot dogs.  It was fun.  It was relaxing.  And for me, it was habit-forming.

Growing up in West Texas, I experienced the thrill of many a spring storm bursting open the sky with ferocious beauty as thunder rocked the heavens and lightning bolts split the darkness.  Sometimes a pelting rain accompanied, sometimes there would come hail, sometimes only a cooling wind would dance through town.  Excited weathermen would broadcast possibilities of damage and danger, but rather than being parked in front of a TV screen, I could usually be found standing on the front porch, mesmerized by the blinding flashes and booms that chilled me to the bone and reflexively forced my hands over my ears.

When I was 18 years old, I became a follower of Jesus.  I began to read the Bible.  I began to attach meaning to many of the things that I saw in the skies.  A rainbow was no longer just a breathtaking sweep of color arching its way across a freshly watered world.  It was a sign hand-painted by God's majestic paintbrush, reminding His children of His eternal covenant with them (Genesis 9:13).

Even imagining God creating the heavens and the sky -- just by the breath of His Word (Genesis 1:1, 8)!  Oh, I hope there are home movies in Heaven!  I began to appreciate the morning sun as more than just a masterpiece of nature.  I learned the miracles of fresh mercies that come with each sunrise (Lamentations 3:23) and the peace of God blanketing over me as I lifted my voice to Him and laid my requests at His feet and waited expectantly (Psalm 3:5).  I learned the blessing of a day coming to its close, night's blushing moon being ushered in by the evening's sunset, the comforting hum of God's voice -- "at night His song is with me." (Psalm 42:8)  To behold a nighttime sky crowded with tiny jewels of light -- awestruck.  Every.  Single.  Time.  And I can't help but imagine the Lord smiling in delight during creation as He tossed sprinkles by the thousands into the pitch black sky (Genesis 1:16)!  And still -- to this day, His evening ritual is to call each one out by name (Isaiah 40:26)!

And just for fun, the Lord gives birds the special privilege of flying into His big, beautiful sky.  And I can't help it -- I want to fly with them, too!  They have a perfect view of His handiwork as they soar above the trees, the mountains, the oceans, the canyons, the waterfalls, the farmers' fields, the skyscrapers.  And they remind me that He cares for me and that there's nothing to worry about with my Father holding me close to His heart (Matthew 6:26).

But what all of this skywatching has really trained me to do is to be prepared for His return.  If His plan for me is that I am still alive on that glorious day, I have this to look forward to:  "For the Lord Himself will come down from Heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first.  After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air.  And so we will be with the Lord forever." (I Thessalonians 4:16-17)

So who can blame me for being addicted to skywatching?!  "The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of His hands." (Psalm 19:1)  Amen!