A Lesson on Creation Based on John Muir’s The Mountains of California
In this lesson students will reflect on how God has revealed himself in creation. In an excerpt from John Muir’s The Mountains of California, students will highlight features of nature that stand out to them and write down what this description reveals about the nature of God and of the mind behind creation. The goal is to guide students to realizations such as “In making the created world beautiful, I can see that God made humans to enjoy creation and that God wants us to be happy,” or “When John Muir says ‘glaciers are still at work in the shadows of the peaks, and thousands of lakes and meadows shine and bloom beneath them,’ this reminds me that God wants us to see big things in life that are beautiful like mountains, but he also wants us to see the beauty in little everyday things like lakes and meadows.” Allow time at the end of the lesson students to share their reflections and insights with a partner or in a small group. Student Handout God’s Gift of Creation from John Muir’s The Mountains of California Before God revealed himself to humanity in scripture, he revealed himself to us through the created world. God, as Creator, has left his fingerprints on the universe. In looking at the world around us, we can come to understand who God is. Read the following passage slowly. As you read, highlight at least two depictions of creation that stand out to you. When you are finished reading, reread the lines you have highlighted. You will then answer the reflection questions found at the bottom of this page. The Sierra is about 500 miles long, 70 miles wide, and from 7000 to nearly 15,000 feet high. In general views no mark of man is visible on it, nor anything to suggest the richness of the life it cherishes, or the depth and grandeur of its sculpture. None of its magnificent forest-crowned ridges rises much above the general level to publish its wealth. No great valley or lake is seen, or river, or group of well-marked features of any kind, standing out in distinct pictures. Even the summit-peaks, so clear and high in the sky, seem comparatively smooth and featureless. Nevertheless, glaciers are still at work in the shadows of the peaks, and thousands of lakes and meadows shine and bloom beneath them, and the whole range is furrowed with cañons to a depth of from 2000 to 5000 feet, in which once flowed majestic glaciers, and in which now flow and sing a band of beautiful rivers. Though of such stupendous depth, these famous canyons are not raw, gloomy, jagged-walled gorges, savage and inaccessible. With rough passages here and there they still make delightful pathways for the mountaineer, conducting from the fertile lowlands to the highest icy fountains, as a kind of mountain streets full of charming life and light, graded and sculptured by the ancient glaciers, and presenting, throughout all their courses, a rich variety of novel and attractive scenery, the most attractive that has yet been discovered in the mountain-ranges of the world. In many places, especially in the middle region of the western flank of the range, the main canyons widen into spacious valleys or parks, diversified like artificial landscape-gardens, with charming groves and meadows, and thickets of blooming bushes, while the lofty, retiring walls, infinitely varied in form and sculpture, are fringed with ferns, flowering-plants of many species, oaks, and evergreens, which find anchorage on a thousand narrow steps and benches; while the whole is enlivened and made glorious with rejoicing streams that come dancing and foaming over the sunny brows of the cliffs to join the shining river that flows in tranquil beauty down the middle of each one of them. Excerpt from John Muir’s “The Mountains of California” Excerpt from The Mountains of California | Penguin Random House Canada What could each of the depictions you highlighted suggest about the nature of God or the mind behind creation? Write a short reflection for each. (For example: “When John Muir says ‘glaciers are still at work in the shadows of the peaks, and thousands of lakes and meadows shine and bloom beneath them,’ this reminds me that God wants us to see big things in life that are beautiful like mountains, but he also wants us to see the beauty in little everyday things like lakes and meadows.”) 1. 2. Katy Wylie Curriculum Intern
