A Trip to Savannah, Georgia

THIS WEEK a whole new year started! We have a whole new year, and thank the Lord. On new year's day my family and I left for Savannah, Georgia, and what do you know? God is there, too.
This week I was juggling alot of homework. I have a science fair due tomorrow that I just finished on this lovely Sunday evening, and I've got several other things happening, too. Although I otherwise should be doing my history reading, I'm blogging to you today because it is Sunday, a special day, and though I unfortunately missed church today I feel that I should make time to do something for God. This is something I do on Sunday (and sometimes Wednesday).
We left for Savannah in the afternoon, not too long before the sun went down. In the car we listened to Owl City (I like "Meteor Shower," and I suggest it to you) and afterward Casting Crowns (my current favorite band, I recommend "The Altar and the Door" CD). To my left the sky is a marvelous rainbow into the western horizon, and before too long there is to my right a yellow-gold moon, 2 times the size the moon usually is, rising. I must have spent 30 minutes just staring into the moon and the sky as it rose so slowly I couldn't see it move at all. I saw the moon on one side of the big, dark blue clouds and waited to see it on the other end as the car moved. I saw it reflect on otherwise invisible ponds, to music, my favorite kind of music. That's something the Lord made, right there. and when I see something like that I wonder how anyone doesn't know there is a God.
Anyway, that evening we found our hotel, which had a fireplace, and left to eat at Bennigans, which is closed in Jacksonville. Then we had a fire in the fireplace and went to bed.
In the morning we enjoyed the hotel's breakfast (I even had some oatmeal with blueberries and nuts. I don't like oatmeal, but they told me it would be good for my throat.). We then went to enjoy the artsy, historical, beautiful city of Savannah with its amazing churches and oak trees, and statues and carriages. It was amazingly cold, especially walking near the river against the wind. But it's just so beautiful.
So after our tour we drove around to find a church we could visit, and we found the Cathedral of St. John the Baptist, the most marvelous cathedral I've ever been inside. I didn't know these things existed outside Europe. There was a marvelous Nativity scene and a fountain of Holy Water. I was particularly interested in the stained glass windows because I'm thinking of going into stained glass, if that is what God is wanting me to do. It was interesting for me because I'm not Catholic, so my formerly-Catholic mother was able to tell me a few interesting things about this denomination that I was not familiar with before. We then went across the street and got coffee, and trekked among the oaks and old houses back to our car.
Later we went to the fresh Market. There's one thing I met with that I wanted to tell you about: I tried some wonderful orange juice that was, like, all orange. I tried it and thought of the verse, "Taste and see that the LORD is good." God made oranges, you know, and they are better for you than Cheeze-its (why do they have to taste so good?) or donuts. He made food that is good for us, because He cares about us - us! - and He wants us to be healthy and eat things like oranges. I just had to mention that because, well, I tasted that juice and I saw that the LORD is good, indeed.
Cheese, Sophie it's just some orange juice. I know! But it was startlingly good orange juice, and it just goes to show that messages are everywhere.
Then I got to eat blue cheese potato salad and a cookie and watch TV with my family by the fire, and after breakfast in the morning we left for Jacksonville. I've been having stomach pains, but maybe that's a good thing because I was feeling tired and sorry enough for myself that I was not doing homework in the car at the time when Keith Urban's song about faith, "You're Not Alone Tonight," came up on our CD. It was at this time that we passed on a highway a lawn of pine trees. A few of the trees I saw were not bigger in diameter than a saucer. HERE is what got me, friend! These thin little trees were, what, thirty, forty feet tall? And they stood! These trees were once little seeds that came off of other pine trees. And here they have shot up into the air and they stand. How do they do that? How, other than by the well-thought Design God put into them, and put them into?
I remarked once to my friend Katie over the Facebook chat, how remarkable it is that pine trees stand, though the wind blows and blows, and they sway and bend, and they just stand and age. This reminded me of that.
Well, God answered my prayer: He led my family safely to Savannah and back and He led me through this science fair so that I can get through this week.
Happy new year to you, friend. Please post and share the miracles you've seen happen this week!