Imagination

Today I was reminded how bad my ADD is.  Near the beginning of Pastor Rick’s sermon in talking about the Trinity, he mentioned that all three members of the Trinity were present at Creation.  I was mentally absent from that moment on to whatever else he said, because my mind went immediately to imagining what it would have been like to be present at Creation.

I love how descriptive so much of the Bible is.  I’m such a visual person, and much of it is written in such a way as to encourage my wild imagination.  Here is what Genesis 1:1-2 says:  “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.  Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.” 

Can you feel the intensity of what is about to take place?  Can you imagine the stage being set in complete darkness and the very presence of God hovering and waiting for the show to begin?  The thundering voice of God shouts for the light to appear and splashes of brilliant colors fly across the sky.  If we think that a sunrise is brilliant as it is now, can you imagine the first one?  Until then, light did not exist at all.  Then at the summons of Almighty God, it is spoken into existence.

Can you imagine the plants growing quickly from the ground, and flowers opening up to see the dawn?  What about animals rising from the dust, trying out their new legs and breathing for the first time?  Fish swim excitedly in the water as the sky grows dark for the first thunderstorm in all creation.  Wow.

Immediately in the middle of this, I thought of my favorite passage in the whole Bible:  Job chapter 38.  If there’s ever a description that causes me to fall to my knees in worship, it is this.  Please take the time to relish and imagine the pictures that God paints as He speaks these words to Job:

“Then the Lord answered Job out of the storm.  He said:

Who is this that darkens my counsel

with words without knowledge?

Brace yourself like a man;

I will question you,

and you shall answer me.

Where were you when I laid the earth’s foundation?

Tell me, if you understand.

Who marked off its dimensions?  Surely you know!

Who stretched a measuring line across it?

On what were its footings set,

or who laid its cornerstone—

while the morning stars sang together

and all the angels shouted for joy?

Who shut up the sea behind doors

when it burst forth from the womb,

when I made the clouds its garment

and wrapped it in thick darkness,

when I fixed limits for it

and set its doors and bars in place,

when I said, ‘This far you may come and no farther;

here is where your proud waves halt’?

Have you ever given orders to the morning,

or shown the dawn its place,

that it might take the earth by the edges

and shake the wicked out of it?

The earth takes shape like clay under a seal;

its features stand out like those of a garment.

The wicked are denied their light,

and their upraised arm is broken.

Have you journeyed to the springs of the sea

or walked in the recesses of the deep?

Have the gates of death been shown to you?

Have you seen the gates of the shadow of death?

Have you comprehended the vast expanses of the earth?

Tell me, if you know all this.

What is the way to the abode of light?

And where does the darkness reside?

Can you take them to their places?

Do you know the paths to their dwellings?

Surely you know, for you were already born!

You have lived so many years!

Have you entered the storehouses of the snow

or seen the storehouses of the hail,

which I reserve for times of trouble,

for days of war and battle?

What is the way to the place where lightning is dispersed,

or the place where the east winds are scattered over the earth?

Who cuts a channel for the torrents of rain,

and a path for the thunderstorm,

to water a land where no man lives,

a desert with no one in it,

to satisfy a desolate wasteland

and make it sprout with grass?

Does the rain have a father?

Who fathers the drops of dew?

From whose womb comes the ice?

Who gives birth to the frost from the heavens

when the waters become hard as stone,

when the surface of the deep is frozen?

Can you bind the beautiful Pleiades?

Can you loose the cords of Orion?

Can you bring forth the constellations in their seasons

or lead out the Bear with its cubs?

Do you know the laws of the heavens?

Can you set up God’s dominion over the earth?

Can you raise your voice to the clouds

and cover yourself with a flood of water?

Do you send lightning bolts on their way?

Do they report to you, ‘Here we are’?

Who endowed the heart with wisdom

or gave understanding to the mind?

Who has the wisdom to count the clouds?

Who can tip over the water jars of the heavens

when the dust becomes hard

and the clods of earth stick together?

Do you hunt the prey for the lioness

and satisfy the hunger of the lions

when they crouch in their dens

or lie in wait in a thicket?

Who provides food for the raven

when its young cry out to God

and wander about for lack of food?”

 God goes on in His description in how He cares for all the wild animals and knows every detail of their lives.  Doesn’t this just take your breath away?    It immediately brings to mind Psalm 8:

“O Lord, our Lord,

how majestic is your name in all the earth!

You have set your glory

above the heavens.

From the lips of children and infants

you have ordained praise

because of your enemies

to silence the foe and the avenger.

When I consider your heavens,

the work of your fingers,

the moon and the stars,

which you have set in place,

what is man that you are mindful of him,

the son of man that you care for him?

You made him a little lower than the heavenly beings

and crowned him with glory and honor.

You made him ruler over the works of your hands;

you put everything under his feet:

all flocks and herds,

and the beasts of the field,

the birds of the air,

and the fish of the sea,

all that swim the paths of the seas.

O Lord, our Lord,

how majestic is your name in all the earth!”

I can’t think of anything more wonderful than the FACT that THIS GOD, who does ALL THESE THINGS would not only know who I am, but He knows everything about me, cares about every hurt that I have faced and will face, and catches all my tears and counts them as precious.  He loves me so extravagantly; I can’t even imagine.  As the sun rises in the crisp cool air of morning and the colors splash across the sky, I can hear Him saying, “I made all this for you.  Drink it in!”  What kind of love is this?

And what kind of love is this that Almighty God would see the hopeless situation of how I have rejected Him and chosen to go my own way, and would put on skin and walk on earth as a man?  What kind of love would suffer and die at the very hands of those He sought to save by His sacrifice?  Those hands that were nailed to a cross formed the animals from the dust of the ground.  The voice that cried, “Father, forgive them; they don’t know what they’re doing!” spoke light and life into existence at the very dawn of time.  Those eyes that looked with mercy on His accusers sees not only the depth of the oceans but also the depth of our need for Him.  So He died.  What kind of love is this?

My imagination cannot even begin to capture how AMAZING the love of God is for us.  I can’t scratch the surface of describing who He is to me, and how He has saved me, redeemed me, and proven Himself to me.  People may ask how I know that God is real, and like Nicole C. Mullen I say to them, “I know my Redeemer lives, I spoke with Him this morning!  Let all creation testify and this life within me cry I know my Redeemer lives!”