Astral Reflection

It's been ages since I last posted, I know. We had Thanksgiving and Christmas and an influx of family, my graduation (yippee!), a departure of family, and a final settling in to accomplish. Not to mention the design of the general psychology course I am teaching this semester! It hasn't left a great deal of time for reflection. As the old year has passed into the new, I've started back to church and begun some daily devotional reading. Among this reading is Glimpses of Grace by Madeleine L'Engle, which is a fantastic little book of daily meditations. L"Engle often mentions the stars and the heavens, prompting a sense of wonder at the general infinity of the universe and the fact that God knows the number of hairs on our heads. In the course of my reading for a lecture on neuropsychology today, the author of the textbook mentioned that the human nervous system is composed of 100 billion neurons--which is approximately the number of stars in our galaxy. For some reason that struck a chord in me--that parallel between the universe and our inner universe. Sort of a beautiful symmetry between macro and micro. The image of stars in my brain makes me smile and gives new meaning to having my head in the clouds. If we were created in God's image, wouldn't it be interesting if the stars we see twinkling in the velvet black of a winter's night are really the neurons in His brain? I was about to say something about the action potential of prayer just there, which is probably a good indicator that I should get back to my lecture writing.