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The late Louis Armstrong was a great jazz trumpeter.He was also world famous because of his gravel voice growling out the words of so many songs. The late Ella Fitzgerald used to bring the house down when she would suddenly slip from her superb, mellow singing voice into an all-but-perfect impersonation of Old Satchmo (or in full 'Satchel-mouth'), which was Louis Armstrong's nickname. Despite appearing on more records and film sound tracks than he could count, he never had one single world hit.You know a top-of-the-charts best selling record. His jazz and style, adored by jazz fans, didn't have mass appeal,until he made the record, "What a wonderful world"
Even his best friends couldn't exactly call it singing, but as an old man he growled the vocal on a slow tuneful little song in which he gravelled: "I see trees of green,skies of blue,and I say to myself, what a wonderful world."
It appealed world-wide, because it was admittedly a sentimental little song, but which tunefully and simply expressed gratitude for the world we are given to live in for the duration of our brief time here. The ugly scars on this beautiful world usually bear the finger prints and hobnail boot marks of us humans. When left to itself the rest of the world of nature and animal life seems to manage quite well without our interference,but that is not the whole picture.
The Book of Genesis depicts our human place in the cosmic scheme of things as being in a partnership with God - a very junior partnership of course, which only works when we do it His way, and not ours.The supreme picture of this wonderful world is called "The Garden of Eden" (or 'Paradise' which is the same word), and we all know what happened when our first ancestor sinned by trying to take over God's role. "I will be as God" he thought, and that's when it all went wrong. In fact Jesus came to repair the very damage done then, to restore the shattered partnership. Nevertheless, even people who live without God are, from time to time, haunted and addressed by the beauty of this planetary home, this beautiful world. This is pure poetry:
You will go out in joy and be led forth in peace; the mountains and hills will burst into song before you, and all the trees of the field will clap their hands.
Isaiah 55:12
"Not in entire forgetfulness, but trailing clouds of glory, do we come, from God who is our home." (Wordsworth)
A Prayer:
"Thee would we praise without ceasing ...Thou callest us to delight in they praise for thou hast made us for thyself, and our hearts find no rest until we rest in thee - who with the Father and the Holy Ghost, all glory, praise and honour be ascribed, both now and for ever more." From St. Augustine, over
sixteen centuries old:
Now read Psalm 8.
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