We Serve an Awesome God

Psalm 19:1, “The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands.”

I am an engineer and programmer by training. I am a plan-your-work – work-your-plan type of guy. I believe that the God of the universe made all of creation and all of science. If we find a conflict between the two, it is because we do not understand something. I’m not smart enough to know what. But I am smart enough to know that I don’t know.

John 1:3, “Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made.”

If we want to glorify ourselves, we don’t do something easy or bland; we stretch our creativity to the max to demonstrate the totality of our ability. We want to stand back, gaze at our creation, and say, “WOW, I did that.”

Hebrews 3:4, “For every house is built by someone, but God is the builder of everything.”

An artist does not paint a picture of a stick-man and put it on display. They paint a picture that stretches their imagination and talent. An image that causes people to look deep at the canvass to discover the complexity, the color, the movement, the depth of the imagery. The viewer not only sees all that the painter wanted them to see, but their imagination brings a deeper meaning to the imagery—each person taking away a fresh perspective of the painter’s work.

Psalm 33:6, “By the word of the Lord the heavens were made, their starry host by the breath of his mouth.”

Over my sofa, I have a large photograph of the milky way taken at Fiordland National Park in New Zealand, by Tom Hall; it is billions of specks of light on an immense canvass of blackness. We, as mere humans, cannot fathom the greatness of God’s creation. It not only overwhelms our senses with the vast, unimaginable majesty of the heavens, but it amazes us with the intricacy of new life. When I first set eyes on my newborn daughter, my life changed forever. She was the most perfect creature I had ever seen. She was so small and beautiful. To this day, that image, planted deep in my mind, brings me peace, joy, and, most of all, hope for humanity.

Job 33:4, “The Spirit of God hath made me, and the breath of the Almighty hath given me life.”

I love to hike. I love the quiet outdoors where God and I can have these long, intricate, astounding conversations uninterrupted by the world in which I must live. The beauty in nature is never-ending. Everything from the leaf’s brilliant colors in fall, to the delicate new sprouts popping up through the earth in the spring, to how deer stay looking so pristine while living in the woods speaks of God’s creation. Folks, that last part is amazing, we have a multi-trillion-dollar industry built around making us look good, and we pale in comparison. I love sunsets and sunrise and waterfalls, unique bends in the trail, and rock formations that remind me of Aunt Sally. My best moments are setting on a rocky crag jutting out of the forest canopy overlooking a river and listening to the wind and the sound of birds. It is the perfect moment. I am so close to God; it takes my breath away.

God has glorified Himself through His creation. He put everything into it. He wanted to demonstrate the breadth and depth of His abilities. He does set back and say, “WOW, I did that.”

In the greatness of His creation, there are human-made flaws. God gave us a choice that we might choose Him. Some do not choose wisely.

A friend, Ron Gastin, said it best when he described this scene: You imagine yourself on a vast and deserted beach. The beautiful white shoreline spreads out before you to the horizon, the aqua blue sea rhythmically splashing to the shore, the azure blue sky shining from above. There is a warm, slight breeze washing over your skin, and the sound of seabird are echoing in the distance: this is God’s macro view, and He loves it infinitely. However, if you kneel and pick up a small handful of sand, you can see the individual specks of sand. These specks are the individual acts of both goodness and sinfulness that, when taken together, make up that vast and beautiful beach. God hates the sinful and evil specks of sand but loves what it ultimately becomes.

So how does darkness fit into all of this?

We are in the throes of a viral pandemic. The media is stoking fear as a means to make money off of advertising, the old newspaper adage “If it bleeds, it leads.” It is easy to get sucked into the vortex of this fear. Is this the beginning of the tribulation, or is it just the next in a line of challenges facing a fallen world? We should live each day as if it was our last. In doing this, we do not need to know the exact day of His coming, for we will be prepared. Rather than spend our time fretting over the end, we should take the time to awe at His creation. When we soak in the beauty that God made around us, it is hard to live in fear.

Romans 1:20, “For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities – his eternal power and divine nature – have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse.”