
I am indebted to Jim Gordon in his blog livingwittily.typepad.com for this quotation from George Adam Smith writing in his commentary, The Book of Isaiah, Vol. II, p. 90.
“When the Psalmist calls Israel to lift their eyes to the hills, or to behold how the heavens declare the glory of God, or to listen to that unbroken knowledge of the Creator which day passes to day and night to night, it is not proofs to doubting minds which they offer: it is nourishment to hungry souls. These are not arguments for the existence of a divine maker. They are sacraments.”
The use of the English language may be of a different time but his declaration is clear. We live in a sacrament. Paul the Christian apostle adds his own conviction “Ever since the creation of the world the eternal nature and divine power of God, invisible though they are have been are understood and seen through the things he has made” Romans 1:20.
The first sacrament is Creation. The biblical sacrament is the natural world.