Perhaps you've heard of the band Led Zeppelin?  One of the biggest bands of the Seventies, Led Zeppelin, a four person band from the backroads of England, rocked the world for nearly a decade until its drummer, John Bonham, died, tragically, of an alcohol induced overdose in 1979 at the age of 27.
     Driving this morning, I bumped into one of, to me, the group's most poignant songs, "Going to California" (maybe I find it particularly moving because I am originally from California!).  I share some of the lyrics:

                   "The sea was red and the sky was grey
                   Wondered how tomorrow could ever follow today.
                   The mountains and the canyons started to tremble and shake
                   As the children of the sun began to awake.
                   Seems that the wrath of the Gods
                   Got a punch on the nose and it started to flow;
                   I think I might be sinking.
                   Throw me a line if I reach it in time
                   I'll zmeet you up there where the path

                   Runs . . . "

     In lilting fashion, these lyrics present an image of simultaneous fear and wonder.  It wonders how tomorrow could ever follow today even as it recognizes that the mountains and canyons began to tremble and shake.  Perhaps this is the wrath of the "Gods," it continues, so, it adds, throw me a line and, I hope, I will reach it in time.

     Rightly do we fear the forces of nature.  Try as we might, we will never master them. Despite all our prognostications, we will never be able to time or predict meteorological upheaveals precisely.  We live in the "mercy" of the "gods" of our world.

     So we look for a line.  And we hope we reach it in time.  And we wonder how tomorrrow could ever follow today.  We wonder how, in this crazy and bewildering world, one thing could possibly follow another, how we can, in the seas of chaos that sweep across our lives, expect the sun to rise the next morning.

     But it always does.  The planet trembles, the planet shakes, but the planet continues. And we rejoice that we live in a world that, despite its fractures, endures.

     We rejoice even more in the dreams and meaning this world engenders.  Even today, California remains a dream for many people, a place of marvel and imagination, a land of ethereal potential.  Maybe it's your dream, maybe it's not.

     Either way, California, and the world in which it is planted, endures.  And it endures with meaning, a meaning birthed and sustained by the only possible thing that can:  God.

     Thanks, Led Zeppelin.