Long Distance MERCY

Psalms 103:11-12
 "For as the heavens are high above the earth, So great is His mercy toward those who fear Him;  As far as the east is from the west, So far has He removed our transgressions from us." 
 Have you ever went outside on a starry night and gazed up into the heavens. I don't know much about the stars, other than they seem to be an eternity away. Yet I feel like I could reach out and touch them. If we think about the vastness of space it can overwhelm us! The heavens are endless. I have an older brother who is a school teacher. He loves astronomy. He has a complete fascination with God's beautiful creation. Whenever we have family gatherings, i.e. "Thanksgiving or Christmas," he always brings his telescope. He is always glad to give a period of instruction to his nieces and nephews about the incredible creation of our God. And of course they love it as much as he does. I like it too and I'm always present. I'm the nervous guy who knows nothing about stars but is ever so guarded of the telescope, In deep prayer!...... praying that my children won't break anything! As he teaches them about the stars, I am always amazed. He will say things like, "the light from these stars has been traveling for many years just to get within our sight!" Huh?......What's that supposed to mean?......I had to process this one.... It means that we are not seeing the stars in "real time!" Depending on which star we are looking at, we may be gazing into light that is several years old. Maybe I'm simple minded or just plain simple but this is mind boggling to me! This puts a whole new perspective on How I see God's mercy! "For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is His mercy toward those who fear Him." There is no end to the mercy of our loving God. If what we can see takes years to travel to us, just consider what's out there that we can't see. If God's mercy were to be visible, what we could see  would be incredibly vast. But God did not say My mercy will end at jupiter or mars or even pluto. He said "as high as the heavens are above the earth." God has no peak! 
 Next we have a geography lesson, so to speak, "As far as the east is from the west, so far He has He removed our sins from us." Let's process this one shall we? East and West never meet! North and South meet. You can actually travel North until you are heading South but if you travel west you can go west forever. If you travel East you can go East forever. What's up with that?....... Maybe God wanted to put a few examples of eternity right in front of our faces. I love this! He gave us something we can almost wrap our thoughts around without completely blowing our minds. Don't miss the good part of this..... His forgiveness is so awesome that He removes our sins from us for all of eternity. What ever sin you carried around with you before you met Jesus is gone FOREVER! You are clothed in His righteousness and if it's not too forward to say," you look good dressed up in God!" I would like to end this devotion in a prayer. It is not original with me. Although, if the truth is told all originality is in our Creator! This prayer is from the Bible. It is what Paul prayed for the Church of Ephesus. It is also a prayer for us. Ephesians 3:14-20
 "14 For this reason I bow my knees to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, 15 from whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, 16 that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with might through His Spirit in the inner man, 17 that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; that you, being rooted and grounded in love, 18 may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the WIDTH and LENGTH and DEPTH and HIEGHT- 19 to know the love of Christ which passes knowledge; that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. 
20 Now to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us,"