God always surprises me because my imagination (colorful and loud as it is) can only think “God is great” but cannot really understand what that means. My noisy and vivid dreams cannot match the enormity of God’s full-color creativity complete with textured pages, pop-up pictures, scratch-and-sniff, and that little panel at the side where you press buttons, and the cow goes “moo.”
My imagination did not give these pictures life, and always remembers only portions of what my senses experienced.
The New, Old Discovery
Maybe, like me, you can hear something a lot of times before it really sinks in. I’ve heard that most people (if you have a photographic memory, don’t gloat) have to read something six times before it sticks.
So, God’s Word says, “Ask the beasts, and they will teach you; the birds of the heavens, and they will tell you; or the bushes of the earth, and they will teach you; and the fish of the sea will declare to you. Who among all these does not know that the hand of the Lord has done this?” (Job 12:7-8).
Yup. Just like that, smack in the head with the palm of my hand — of course, all of the earth proclaims God’s genius; his dominion. His beautiful scent, the echo of his voice calling the earth and all its inhabitants into being — they linger in the markings of each living thing.
But in the past year, I have seen them as if for the first time, as I have also done at other times and will do again. I saw creation this way when my babies were small (they’re now full-fledged adults) and if they have kids, I’ll see the world afresh once more with each infant’s impressions.
Ducks, Geese, Owls
So much of what I noticed had always been there. I was just preoccupied with the daily “to-do list.” That list shrunk considerably once we couldn’t get together with friends. My life once seemed to revolve around people; it was big and full.
At least I still had my job in a grocery store, but when I couldn’t fellowship face-to-face, I heard too much of my own voice. My world was small.
While taking a walk during the best time (5:30-6:30 a.m.), I always see plenty of life now. I used to see my lists. My day stretching out ahead of me, and the week, and the obligations. Now, I watch an owl swoop from one tree to another ahead of me, or a goose, gander, and their goslings crossing a pond by a farm, while the roosters crow from a barn several hundred feet over the grassy hill behind them.
Coots and ducks drift, crows mimic the meows of farm cats, and the cackling of chickens — wrens flit in and out of spiky bushes on the verge. So fast. So busy. This isn’t for my entertainment, all this action.
In fact, some of their noise and movement is probably a fearful outcry. I’m just an oblivious human, loving their color and song and the picturesque scene of day breaking against my hardened senses.
A piece of that coldness broke away with their energy, I’m so grateful. But another thing broke — the idea that my world really was big — it wasn’t. My world is small, and God is unfathomable.
Maintaining a Sense of Awe
Now that I have relearned how to marvel, I’m afraid of becoming desensitized again. But I can also take heart because the Lord, in his mercy, frequently repeats himself. He frequently reminded his people of his loving character.
He encouraged them not to be afraid. “Fear not, nor be afraid; have I not told you from of old and declared it? And you are my witnesses! Is there a God besides me? There is no Rock; I know not any” (Isaiah 44:8).
He said something similar elsewhere too: “Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be frightened, and do not be dismayed, for the LORD your God is with you wherever you go” (Joshua 1:9).
What does this have to do with birds and sunrises? Or with a desire to always regard God’s creation with a sense of wonder? They all call to mind the enormity of the Lord, of his creation, and of his ongoing hand in everything around me.
I see, in my littleness, not a merciless despot of a God but a gracious Father who, in spite of his eternality, reaches into my tiny “now-ness” to help me:
1. God will remind his people if they forget something important.Have you also lost your sense of wonder? Then maybe the pandemic really spoke to this brokenness, the part that was going through the motions.
The Lord was trying to get your attention through the simplest methods, and you were ignoring him? I certainly didn’t see his grandeur nearly as well as I do now.
2. God loves to give us good gifts to his children. “If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him!” (Matthew 7:11).
How wonderful to think of it — God will remind us that he loves to shower us with his love. He has already done that by the gift of his Son’s death and resurrection, but that doesn’t stop Almighty God from giving lavishly of his creative genius.
3. Fear and awe are similar. One definition of the word “awe” is “fear.” Whom do we fear? Whom do we hold in reverence or awe? “And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell” (Matthew 10:28).
Be afraid, but not as though the Lord will commit evil against you. The Lord is always just. He loves you. Just as Jesus said, why would he give his children stones to eat when even the most sinful father would give his child bread?
Fear in this sense is respect and awe. I want to take more time to sit in a moment of wonder, every day ideally.
Do Not Fail to Fear the Living God
So, what Jesus might have been saying is “yes, be fearful, but only of God. And not in a cowering sense; not as though he will crush you. Pray to him. Bow to him. Respect and revere him, with the trembling, which is his due.
He brought you here, to this earth; he formed you and gave your life in his image. Your mother’s empty threat is actually true of God: “I brought you into this world and I can take you out of it!” We must stand in awe of this God, but that trembling is not as one who expects the end to come.
We tremble knowing we have been spared to examine, to enjoy, to declare God’s glory. So, if you also heard the crows and watched the geese and thought “what a marvelous God!” and if you felt a sense of awe and wonder today, that was a gift. Remember that it’s a gift; remember where it came from.
For further reading:
How Are We Created in the Image of God?
Does God Have a Sense of Humor?
What Is the Creation Story in the Bible?
What Does ‘The Earth Is the Lord's’ Mean in Psalm 24?
What Does it Mean God Is Good?
Photo Credit: ©iStock/Getty Images Plus/nata_zhekova
