Welcome to my blog! I am not sure I’m actually a blog-writer but, with the encouragement of friends, I decided to take the plunge and start one anyway.

Ironically, as I’m writing this I’m thinking about a letter we recently received — we enjoy receiving letters and cards. And this one was from a young lady called Grace who, at the time, we’d never met. However, it wasn’t the fact that she was visiting Mongolia that caught our attention specifically, rather it was that she described herself as someone who ‘absolutely loves God’, not someone who just loves God but someone who absolutely loves God.

Her candour evoked in our minds a picture of a young woman with arms open wide worshipping God face down on the floor. Her honesty also reminded me of a prayer I often feel like shouting but don’t. You see I’m English and sometimes the constraints of my culture keep my mouth closed. But the truth is there are many times when I stifle the desire to shout with all might, “Lord, let me live for your glory alone.” I know it’s an audacious request and I do wonder whether, in my fickleness, I can live for the glory of God alone.

Grace’s extravagant love for God reminds us that we simply reflect what we have seen, understood and received of God’s extravagance. If we stand in His presence then we become reflectors of His goodness, of His glory. Over the last few months we’ve been thinking about the glory of God, and since the long winter has passed here we’ve noticed that the countryside is brimming with life.

We live on the northern edge of Ulaanbaatar, about twenty kilometres from the city centre, in an area that’s the summer location for many city people. As soon as school finishes, families migrate to simple one-roomed wooden cabins for the duration of the holidays. The valleys and hills around us are still covered with cabins — although the recent building boom has meant many have been demolished and replaced with larger properties.

In summer the dawn comes early and the darkness is not in a hurry to return. Children spend their days playing outside with the simplest toys: stones and sand, water and sticks. Overcome with tiredness they collapse in flimsy dens and snooze until the sun begins to wane. When they wake, refreshed, they go shouting and screaming, wrestling and tumbling their way through the long grass. At night their parents bring their wood-burning stoves outside, and while the fire gets hot they exchange tots of vodka until the spit and crackle of roasting meat fills the air.

Our valley is alive with life. Cheeky young marmots hide behind rocks before fleeing with a hop, skip and jump back to their burrows. Asian red squirrels, which are mostly black, dash up trees from where they taut dogs who refuse to believe they too can’t climb trees. Cows roam in through our open gate to feast on tasty grass before heading to the next enclosure. Horses stand cooling in the stream near our house while a crane struts in the calm shallows, unperturbed by the horses or the women gathering water in plastic containers.

We walk along the banks finding a quiet place to sit and watch the light dance on the water. In a shady bend the bough of a tree hangs over the stream. Ripples of silver light touch the underside of that branch as it reflects the temporary glory of the golden water and we ask, “Are we catching glimpses of God’s glory?” Hidden in the curve of the steam are we seeing the reflection of His light? Is He passing by, casting shadows that cause us to cry out with longing, longing that we might see more of him? I am not sure. But certainly my heart praises Him and with Grace says “I absolutely love God.”