A Day with 'Aminals' (Stuffed)

Last week my wife and I took my brother's family to the Museum of Natural History in New York. It's an easy 30 minutes from my house if you leave early on a Saturday morning. I hadn't been there since my own two daughters were small, and I looked forward to seeing all the changes and new exhibits through the eyes of my nephew Ben (5), and my niece Maggie (3).

The museum is a marvelous place to contemplate the creativity of God in the wonders of nature, especially accompanied by children. It is indeed a temple to nature, but behind nature is nature's God, who ordains and sustains all things. As the old hymn says,

All things bright and beautiful,
All creatures great and small,
All things wise and wonderful:
The Lord God made them all.

The highlights of the day were, of course, the reconstructed dinosaur bones (especially T-Rex) and the great blue whale which hangs from the ceiling in the hall of ocean creatures. I was struck at how many exhibits had not changed since my own childhood. The whole place has a charming 19th century feel to it that could not be erased by all the technological googaws which are now present everywhere. My favorite moment came when Maggie peered deeply into the rain forest exhibit and said to me, "I see aminals in there." My 43 year old eyes saw only vines, but I doubt her not.

Such a visit always makes one ponder the great questions of time and evolution, but such thoughts were banished in the amazement I saw in my niece and nephew's eyes. It was the innate recognition that we and all of life are "fearfully and wonderfully made" (Ps 139).