Get Away From It All!

“A man doesn’t begin to attain wisdom until he recognizes that he is no longer indispensable.”—Admiral Richard E. Byrd.

Why did famous Antarctic explorer Admiral Byrd say this? What is it that he learned during his explorations that we must learn?

Admiral Byrd, explorer

In order to figure out what lessons he learned, first we must learn about the man. Admiral Byrd was born in 1888, and he developed a fascination with flying during World War I while in the U.S. Navy. After leaving the Navy, he started participating in polar exploration, becoming known as the first man to fly over the North Pole.

After that, he set his eyes south, flying over the South Pole as well. Yet he did much more than fly over the South Pole in the cold, desolate deserts of Antarctica. He established bases such as Little America, endured dreadful experiences in the cold, fought through swirling windstorms that threatened to kill him and his men, and performed scientific experiments on the barren ice that were unprecedented during his day.

Once the admiral attempted to live in a small, isolated base by himself through the long winter, but almost died due to carbon monoxide poisoning. He led many research teams through the Antarctic wilderness, creating an awareness of this forbidding land that captured the interest of a people in the middle of the Great Depression.

He saw the worst that nature had to offer, with fierce blizzards, powerful ice that threatened to crush his support vessels, unimaginable cold and the unbroken darkness of a long winter. Yet he also saw the astonishing aurora australis, the magnificent views from volcanoes at the bottom of the earth and the spectacles of the sun shining on a snowy land full of ice, wonder and majesty. All this shaped Admiral Byrd.

The power of nature

Admiral Byrd could tell us all about the power of nature. He had seen its worst and its best. He knew what immense cold was like and he also knew what despair was like. Yet he kept going back to that same barren land time and time again. Every time he went, something struck him.

Ironically, the same thing struck a man with very different circumstances and experiences 2,000 years ago. The apostle Paul states it very well in Romans 1:20-21: “For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse, because, although they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God, nor were thankful, but became futile in their thoughts, and their foolish hearts were darkened.”

Admiral Byrd said something similar himself: “And here I was, near the axis of the world, in the darkness where the stars make a circle in the sky. At that moment the conviction came to me that the harmony and rhythm were too perfect to be a symbol of blind chance or an accidental offshoot of the cosmic process; and I knew that a Beneficent Intelligence pervaded the whole. It was a feeling that transcended reason; that went to the heart of a man’s despair and found it groundless.”

When you see nature, both the best and the worst, there is no way that you can deny the existence of the Creator God and still be honest with yourself. The whole creation is just so wonderful that it is beyond the realm of blind chance. Nature shows us God and the wonders of His power in ways that nothing else can.

Can you see?

As wonderful and powerful as nature is, can we truly see its majesty and beauty? Or is our vision of nature dimmed by street lights, skyscrapers, fences and smog?

Many of us don’t see nature in a way that truly shows us God. Most of us probably live in cities where our view of nature is very limited—limited as in Animal Planet and Discovery Channel glimpses. Others of us live in the numerous towns or villages around the world. We see more of nature than those in the city, but do we truly see what God wants us to see of His creation?

Life is very fast-paced, and sometimes we really need a break. Where would it be better to spend a relaxing vacation than in the countryside with God’s creation? Sometimes, we just have to get away from it all in order to truly relax and enjoy the creation that God has put on this earth for us to see.

So let’s take a break and smell the roses! Once we get away from it all and see God’s creation, we’ll want to keep coming back for more and more and more!

Joshua Travers is a high school senior in Vinton County High School who attends the Athens, Ohio, congregation of the Church of God, a Worldwide Association.

For more about God’s creation, see:

• Meet Your Maker
• Where Did God Come From?
• Stories of Blessings From Camp and Beyond