Tag: Creation

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In the Beginning God

Daily Reading

Genesis 1-3

Daily Thought

God said of Adam, after he ate the forbidden fruit, “Behold, the man has become like one of us in knowing good and evil” (Genesis 3:22).

That seems oddly forbidden. What is wrong with knowing good and evil? After all, my children know good and evil because I teach them good and evil, and I teach them to favor the good! Have I been feeding my children the forbidden fruit? Why was eating from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil a bad thing?

The answer is tucked into the first four words of the Bible, “In the beginning God.” This is the reality into which Adam and Eve were created, and it is where they belonged. They did not spend their days analyzing good and evil; they simply lived in God’s creation as he designed it. They lived rightly without effort, without inner debate–without choosing. Now that they have eaten the fruit, everything changed. Suddenly, they had to think about good and evil. They get to choose one or the other. They want to choose. They want the power of that choice.

Their lust to choose was stronger than their love of living in God’s Eden.

We must teach our children the difference between good and evil because Adam and Eve introduced this burden to us. Now, we must teach our children how to choose. The best way to choose wisely is to follow God closely, the way it was in the beginning before the serpent.

When Jesus prayed, “Your Kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven” (Matthew 6:10), he declared our wonderful and future hope: that in God’s Kingdom come, evil will be abolished. We will live in a world, not without choice, but without an alternative. God is on the throne and righteousness reigns. We will return to “In the beginning God.”

Daily Prayer

Creator God, loving Father, what a world you created! Awesome and amazing. Thank You for life. It is purely wonderful, meaning it is wonderful when it is pure. I am so sorry for fouling things up, for going my own way, for not following You. Thank You for changing my heart, for pursuing me and teaching me to pursue You, for giving me life anew.

Daily Question

What can you do today to bring your desires into alignment with God’s desires for you?

 

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Very Good

Daily Reading

John 1-2

Daily Thought

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” ~John 1:1

Thus, John opens the curtain of his Gospel echoing the first words of the Bible, “In the beginning God” (Genesis 1:1), because Jesus was there at the beginning because Jesus is God. Jesus, with his Father and Spirit, holy Trinity, spoke our world into existence and, with each creative Word, declared, “It is good” (Genesis 1:4, 10, 12, 18, 21, 25). It continued to be good until God created man, and it was “not good that the man should be alone” (Genesis 2:18), and woman was formed and there came a wedding. and with that, a celebration. “It was very good” (Genesis 1:31), the grand finale of Creation.

It is no surprise, then, a wedding is the scene of the first miracle. “On the third day there was a wedding at Cana in Galilee” (John 2:1), but “the wine ran out, and the mother of Jesus said to him, ‘They have no wine’” (John 2:3), to which Jesus responded, “Woman, what does this have to do with me? (John 2:4). 

It has everything to do with Jesus. 

In Creation, God filled the earth with “every tree that is pleasant to the sight and good for food” (Genesis 2:9), enough for every one to feast, but now there is not enough and it is not good and must be made good again. So Jesus took six water jars, “each holding twenty or thirty gallons” (John 2:6), and turned water into wine, and “the master of the feast called the bridegroom and said to him, ‘Everyone serves the good wine first, and when people have drunk freely, then the poor wine. But you have kept the good wine until now’” (John 2:9-10). 

It was very good.

This, the first of his signs, Jesus did at Cana in Galilee, and manifested his glory. And his disciples believed in him. ~John 2:11

This is Jesus, “the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth” (John 1:14). Our lesson is learned from his mother, who, when the wine ran out, turned to the servants and said, “Do whatever he tells you” (John 2:5). 

Daily Prayer

King of kings and Lord of lords, Maker of the heavens and earth, the First and the Last, Alpha and Omega, the Beginning and the End. You have made all things and in You all things hold together.

What a wonderful world made by a Wonderful Maker, but we no longer knew You. The wine ran out, and then You became flesh, human, one of us. Creator took the form of creation, so we could know You and it will be very good again.

Amen

Daily Question

Where do you find the goodness of God in creation?

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Something Good

Daily Reading

Jeremiah 10-13

Daily Thought

“But the Lord is the true God;
he is the living God and the everlasting King.
It is he who made the earth by his power,
who established the world by his wisdom,
and by his understanding stretched out the heavens.” ~Jeremiah 10:10, 12

In a discussion of first causes, or “what started everything,” the believer’s answer is God. Then comes the snappy retort, “But, who created God?” 

Really? 

If someone else created God, would not that someone else then be God? Then who created that someone? And that one, and the next one. Ad infinitum. The point is there is a beginning and either nothing or something or, better yet, Someone started everything. Those are the choices.

Idolatry is replacing God with something else, but Jeremiah argues that anything else is actually nothing: “Idols are like scarecrows in a cucumber field, and they cannot speak; they have to be carried, for they cannot walk. Do not be afraid of them, for they cannot do evil, neither is it in them to do good” (Jeremiah 10:5). Our idols nowadays are not so much wood and stone, but ideas. In college, I was unprepared for an essay exam, so I wrote a lot of nothing, hoping volume would pass for knowledge. When the paper was graded and returned, the professor had written across the front, large and in red, “This is not right. It is not even wrong.” A lot of our ideas are volume passing for knowledge. They are nothing. Not bad, not good. Nothing. 

“Every goldsmith is put to shame by his idols, for his images are false, and there is no breath in them. They are worthless, a work of delusion.” ~Jeremiah 10:14-15

The problem with nothing is, well, Billy Preston sang it, “Nothin’ from nothin’ leaves nothin’.” There is a simple poetic sense to that. “Nothing comes from nothing. Nothing ever could,” chirps Julie Andrews in Sound of Music. “So somewhere in my youth or childhood, I must have done something good.” 

She is on to something.

And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good. ~Genesis 1:31

Daily Prayer

My Father in heaven, You are holy and good, righteous and wonderful, and You made me in Your image. I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Every one is.

I know, God, that I am Your creation, accountable to You. I am not my own, I belong to You, and the welfare of others is my concern because it is Your concern. You have blessed me, Lord, and I shall strive to be a blessing to others. What I have I will share, holding loosely all that You have placed in my possession. May I be an agent of Your grace to this world.

Amen

Daily Question

Where do you see the goodness of God in creation?

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An Awful Lot of Space

Daily Reading

Psalm 103-105

Daily Thought

“The universe is a pretty big space. It’s bigger than anything anyone has ever dreamed of before,” says Ellie Arroway, a character in the movie “Contact,” adapted from a novel by American astrophysicist Carl Sagan. “So, if it’s just us, seems like an awful waste of space, right?” As if size makes a difference. She dreams of the greatness of the universe, but cannot imagine the grandeur of God.

O Lord my God, you are very great!
You are clothed with splendor and majesty,
covering yourself with light as with a garment,
stretching out the heavens like a tent.
He lays the beams of his chambers on the waters;
he makes the clouds his chariot;
he rides on the wings of the wind.” ~Psalm 104:1-3

If, to God, “a thousand years are but as yesterday” (Psalm 90:4), then what of light years and solar systems and black holes and galaxies and an awful lot of space? There is no difference in effort to create birds that fly or stars that shoot, so even if it’s just for us, I delight in creation and adore the Creator, and that is the point. “O Lord, how manifold are your works! In wisdom have you made them all” (Psalm 104:24). A wall calendar might do, but God “made the moon to mark the seasons” (Psalm 104:19). God fills the dreams of the Psalm writers, so that we would look to the stars and know “as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his steadfast love toward those who fear him” (Psalm 103:11).

The universe is a pretty big space and that is an awful lot of love.

Daily Prayer

My God, Maker of the heavens, Creator of the earth, wow! What a world! Your fingerprints are seen in everything, the wisdom of Your ways, the wonder of Your workmanship. You are mighty and majestic, and You are my God.

I’m amazed at Your attention, that You look after me, and more, that You rescued me. You, the king of the heavens became a baby on earth, and served man, and died for me. There is no greater love, no wonder you made a big universe to display it.  You are worthy of my praise and my all. I worship You.

Amen

Daily Question

What do you learn about God when you look up at the heavens?

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God

Daily Reading

Job 38-39

Daily Thought

God speaks, at last, “Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge? Dress for action like a man; I will question you, and you make it known to me.” And he began to question Job, “Who shut in the sea with doors when it burst out from the womb, and said, ‘Thus far shall you come, and no farther, and here shall your proud waves be stayed’?” (Job 38:8, 11).

There are 362 quintillion gallons of water in the ocean. That is 362 billion billion or 3.62×1020 or 362,000,000,000,000,000,000. Or 7,250,000,000,000,000,000 bathtubs or 15,000,000,000,000,000 swimming pools, if that makes it easier.

“Can you bind the chains of the Pleiades or loose the cords of Orion? Do you know the ordinances of the heavens? Can you establish their rule on the earth?” (Job38:31, 33)

On a clear, moonless night, a few thousand stars are visible, of the 10,000,000,000 in the Milky Way galaxy. Some estimate there are 10 billion billion stars in the universe, but NASA put the number precisely at gazillions.

“Can you hunt the prey for the lion? Do you know when the mountain goats give birth? Do you observe the calving of the does? Who has let the wild donkey go free? Who has loosed the bonds of the swift donkey, is the wild ox willing to serve you? Do you give the horse his might? Do you clothe his neck with a mane? Is it by your understanding that the hawk soars and spreads his wings toward the south? Is it at your command that the eagle mounts up and makes his nest on high?” (Job 38:39; 39:1, 5, 9, 19, 26-27)

Estimates range from 5 million to 100 million different species on earth, but we’ve identified less than 2 million. Breaking this down into categories, zoologists come up with 20,000 species of fish, 6,000 species of reptiles, 9,000 of birds, 1,000 amphibians, and 15,000 species of mammals. The remaining millions are, you’ll be happy to know, insects and spiders. As to the total number of individual animals, the scientific estimate is, “I have absolutely no idea.”

“Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me, if you have understanding. Who determined its measurements–surely you know! Or who stretched the line upon it? On what were its bases sunk, or who laid its cornerstone, when the morning stars sang together and all the sons of God shouted for joy? (Job 38:4-7).

God. That’s the answer. To everything. God.

Job said nothing. Sometimes it is the right time to be quiet, be still, and know that He is God.

Daily Prayer

Creator God, what a world I live in, created by Your hands, Your Word, Your breath. What a delight to look at the heavens and think of You. I marvel at the myriad shapes and sizes of Your creatures. Look at us, man and woman, a reflection of Your image.

May I, God, never cease my amazement at Your creativity. May I be a good steward of what You have placed in my care. May I use all things as You intended, to ultimately glorify You.

Amen

Daily Question

What are some of the things in creation that cause you to be still and worship?

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Sunsets

Daily Reading

Romans 1-3

Daily Thought

Paul has longed to share the Gospel with the Romans, “for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek” (Romans 1:16). By Greek, Paul means Gentiles, the non-Jews. Speaking to the Romans of a Jewish Savior, Paul begins with something they have in common, with the world they can see, in order to explain the unseen, “for what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made” (Romans 1:19-20).

I looked up the science of a sunset: the Raleigh equation along with Mie theory employing discrete dipole approximation will mathematically account for the enhancement of the colors of the sky. 

Okay.

Then I looked at the sunset. The firmament unfolding in front of me, colors stroking the heavens. I called my wife and holding her hand, we gazed. Whatever she was doing would wait because the world had stopped and we surveyed the skies, taking time to taste the wonder of the Almighty. “The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork. Day to day pours out speech, and night to night reveals knowledge” (Psalm 19:1-2).

Science can explain how a beautiful sunset comes to be, but not why we stop and stand and stare in wonder. This is worship.

Daily Prayer

Wonderful God, what an incredible creation. The splendor, the spectacular array of colors, shapes, aromas. They speak of Your majesty, Your artistry, Your creativity, Your wisdom, Your power. All of creation glorifies You.

You have called me Your “poema,” Your workmanship, Your poem. God, when I look at each person You created, I see a work of art. Your work. My Creator, I pray I will always treat Your workmanship with love and respect, appreciating the wonder of Your handiwork in each and every one of us. I stand and gaze and marvel at Your creation. I worship You. Oh my God, my Creator, my Savior, Heavenly Father, Lord. What a life! You are wonderful.

Amen

Daily Question

What in creation speaks most to you of God? What does it say to you about God?

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The Lord is There

Daily Reading

Ezekiel 46-48

Daily Thought

Ezekiel was a prophet to a nation that had forgotten God, but a nation that forgets God destroys not God, but itself. Had God forgotten Israel became Israel’s true fear. He had not, and Ezekiel, a book of hope, closes with the prophet’s final word, “And the name of the city from that time on shall be, ‘The Lord Is There’” (Ezekiel 48:35).

A nation that had forgotten God was first to space in 1961. “Why should you clutch at God?” Nikita Khrushchev, Premier of the Soviet Union, challenged any who believe. “We have flown into space and saw no God.” 

United States astronaut William Anders responded on Christmas Eve, 1968, as Apollo 8 entered lunar orbit on the first manned mission to the Moon, “We are now approaching lunar sunrise and, for all the people back on Earth, the crew of Apollo 8 has a message that we would like to send to you. In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters. And God said, Let there be light: and there was light. And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness.”

Astronaut Jim Lovell continued, “And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day. And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters. And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament: and it was so. And God called the firmament Heaven. And the evening and the morning were the second day.”

Astronaut Frank Borman closed, “And God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear: and it was so. And God called the dry land Earth; and the gathering together of the waters called he Seas: and God saw that it was good. And from the crew of Apollo 8, we close with good night, good luck, a Merry Christmas – and God bless all of you, all of you on the good Earth.”

Seven months later, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin step onto the surface of the moon. “When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou has ordained,” read Aldrin from Psalm 8, “What is man that thou art mindful of him? And the Son of Man, that thou visitest Him?”

“For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse.” ~Romans 1:20

Astronaut John Glenn, who had circled the earth three times on a space flight in 1963, did it again in 1998 aboard the Space Shuttle Discovery. At age 77, he took time to reflect as he observed the heavens and earth from the windows of Discovery, “To look out at this kind of creation and not believe in God is to me impossible.”

“The Lord Is There” ~Ezekiel 48:35

Daily Prayer

God of Heavens, Your glory shines in all that I see. The whole world speaks of You. Your majesty is seen in the depth of sea and the breadth of space. The world is in Your palm, and You breathe life into me. It makes sense that my thoughts turn to You, but I am amazed that Your thoughts turn to me. Who am I? And yet You delight in me.

God, may I find my pleasure and purpose in following You.

Amen

Daily Question

Do you agree with John Glenn, when looking down at earth from the space shuttle, he remarked, “To look out at this kind of creation and not believe in God is to me impossible”? Why or why not?

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God’s Temple

Daily Reading

Ezekiel 40-42

Daily Thought

Behold, there was a man whose appearance was like bronze, with a linen cord and a measuring reed in his hand. And he was standing in the gateway. 4 And the man said to me, “Son of man, look with your eyes, and hear with your ears, and set your heart upon all that I shall show you, for you were brought here in order that I might show it to you.” ~Ezekiel 40:3-4

Notice every detail. Because Ezekiel did. As chapter 40 begins and continues for several chapters, Ezekiel is given a vision of God’s plan for his Temple. Every gate, every wall, every room, every table is assigned by God and carefully measured by the reed in his hand. This is the Temple in which God would dwell in the midst of his people. Who would build it, or when, is not mentioned, but the measurements are meticulous. It would be built. 

To the time of Ezekiel, there had been the tabernacle of Moses and the temple of Solomon. Following the exile, there would be a temple rebuilt, and then Herod’s Temple, which stood at the time of Jesus, but was destroyed by the Romans in AD 70. Now, one temple remains, but it is not built of stone which does not last: “Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body” (1Corinthians 6:19-20). I need only note the care to which God commanded Ezekiel to measure the Temple to understand it is me who is being measured.  

For you formed my inward parts;
you knitted me together in my mother’s womb.
I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.
Wonderful are your works;
my soul knows it very well. ~Psalm 139:13-14

Look in the mirror and see the wonder of one created in the image of God–“in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them” (Genesis 1:27). O Christian, you are God’s Temple. Notice every detail, because God does. 

“For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.” ~Ephesians 2:10

Daily Prayer

Creator God, what an amazing world. Just the idea that I am here amazes me. In the corner of this vast universe, You pay attention to me. And I pay attention to You. Sometimes. How can the Creator of the universe love me so deeply, and I take You for granted all too often. You know the beginning and the end. You set the foundations of the world and write Your story in history. We open Your Word and we find truth to live by and a future to hope for. 

Your church is the future, the body of Christ who will make the mystery of grace known in this world. I stand beside You, God, because You are the author of life and You have the Last Word. What You say happens. I will listen to Your Word, and I will follow it, because Your Word is worthy of my trust. How great is my God.

Amen

Daily Question

What does it mean to you that you are fearfully and wonderfully made by God?

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The Concert of Creation

Daily Reading

Ezekiel 28-30

Daily Thought

“The heavens declare the glory of God,
and the sky above proclaims his handiwork.
Day to day pours out speech,
and night to night reveals knowledge.
There is no speech, nor are there words,
whose voice is not heard.
Their voice goes out through all the earth,
and their words to the end of the world.” ~Psalm 19:1-4

Creation is dazzling and delightful, grand and good, loudly and clearly trumpeting the splendor of God. You cannot miss it.

Yet somehow we do.  

Instead, we worship idols. We worship things. We worship ourselves. Presented with the concert of creation declaring the majesty of the Creator, we pick up a mirror and admire ourselves, and Ezekiel calls out the prince of Tyre as a most egregious example. “Your heart was proud because of your beauty; you corrupted your wisdom for the sake of your splendor,” accuses Ezekiel (Ezekiel 28:17). 

This was the sin of Tyre; it is the ruin of all who exchange the Creator for the created. Our sin is our self obsession. The worship of idols is the worship of self, for they are made in our image. 

Say to the prince of Tyre, “Thus says the Lord God:
‘Because your heart is proud,
and you have said, ‘I am a god,
I sit in the seat of the gods,
in the heart of the seas,’
yet you are but a man, and no god.’” ~Ezekiel 28:1

The prophet’s purpose is to correct us, to remind us again and again what creation speaks everyday, “Then they will know that I am the Lord” (Ezekiel 28:23, 24, 26; 29:9, 16, 21; 30:8, 19, 26). These are an echo of the first words of the Bible, “In the beginning God” (Genesis 1:1), and once should have been enough. There is but one God, and it is not me.

Daily Prayer

God, I love You and praise You, and my praise comes first from hearing it in Your creation. The beauty and majesty, the order and truth that is seen in the heavens and the earth make known that there is God. It is You who deserves my allegiance, my trust, my life.

May my life display sacrifice and love toward You. My actions will sing Your praise before my voice does. You are my God; may I live a life that backs it up.

Amen

Daily Question

Why do people worship idols instead of the very real God?

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Sunsets

Daily Reading

Romans 1-3

Daily Thought

Paul has longed to share the Gospel with the Romans, “for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek” (Romans 1:16). By Greek, Paul means Gentiles, the non-Jews. Speaking to the Romans of a Jewish Savior, Paul begins with something they have in common, with the world they can see, in order to explain the unseen, “for what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made” (Romans 1:19-20).

I looked up the science of a sunset: the Raleigh equation along with Mie theory employing discrete dipole approximation will mathematically account for the enhancement of the colors of the sky. Okay.

Then I looked at the sunset. The sky unfolding in front of me, colors stroking the heavens. I called my wife and holding her hand, we gazed. Whatever she was doing would wait, because the world had stopped, and we surveyed the skies, taking time to taste the wonder of the Almighty. “The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork. Day to day pours out speech, and night to night reveals knowledge” (Psalm 19:1-2). Science can explain how a beautiful sunset comes to be, but not why we stand in wonder and gaze. This is worship.

Daily Prayer

Wonderful God, what an incredible creation. The splendor, the spectacular array of colors, shapes, aromas. They speak of Your majesty, Your artistry, Your creativity, Your wisdom, Your power. All of creation glorifies You.

You have called me Your “poema,” Your workmanship, Your poem. God, when I look at each person You created, I see a work of art. Your work. My Creator, I pray I will always treat Your workmanship with love and respect, appreciating the wonder of Your handiwork in each and every one of us. I stand and gaze and marvel at Your creation. I worship You. Oh my God, my Creator, my Savior, Heavenly Father, Lord. What a life! You are wonderful.

Amen