Thursday, May 31, 2018

Still There


Thursday, May 31, 2018
You made all the delicate, inner parts of my body and knit me together in my mother’s womb.  Thank you for making me so wonderfully complex!  Your workmanship is marvelous—how well I know it.  You watched me as I was being formed in utter seclusion, as I was woven together in the dark of the womb.  You saw me before I was born.  Every day of my life was recorded in your book.  Every moment was laid out before a single day had passed.  How precious are your thoughts about me, O God.  They cannot be numbered!  I can’t even count them; they outnumber the grains of sand!  And when I wake up, you are still with me!   Psalm 139:13-18(NLT)
There are those times I go through some pretty wide sweeps of thought ranging from the pit to pinnacle.  If you’re an introvert you do a lot of reflecting in the quiet times like now; the sun isn’t quite up, and Wellie and Gracie (the dogs who own us) haven’t yet demanded to be fed.  It’s quiet; I can think.
In these early-hour moments I keep the sense of awe that King David expresses in this Psalm.  It’s that the hand which knit me together in my mother’s womb, and the divine eyes that scrutinized the assembling of every molecule as I came together, before I had a single awakening thought or sensation of the sun on my face – THAT God, knows every complexity that makes me a soul.  I am, from the DNA in my bloodstream, to the flesh, bone, sinew and impulses of my brain, soul and spirit, a constant evidence of God’s loving care. 
He thinks about me!  And would that be a strange idea, considering I have as many moving parts as it takes to do anything at all?  There are billions of cells which form Russell, all working together under the supervision of God’s creative hand.
There is a theory I first heard in seminary years ago about the beginnings of the universe, and God’s involvement, if (according to this theory) there is a God at all.  God, if he ever existed, created the universe like a master clockmaker puts together a timepiece.  He wound it up, and left it to run; God never tinkers with it…it’s up to us to make sense of the time of day, and what to do about all we encounter.  We are in charge; there’s nothing else.
Now, a theory like that is espoused by those who fear that there really might be a God Who is involved in the affairs of humankind, but is more afraid to finally deny God altogether…just in case!  So he comes up with a theory that allows God a “hand” in getting things started, but doesn’t really care about us.  It’s a way of gaining a degree of separation from a holy-Creator God by obscurring the line between moral behavior with its’ accountability, as opposed to doing what we want without guilt.  No matter how you explain it, we have to call it what it is – rebellion; we are made in God’s image, but we are definitely children of Adam.
All of that to say this:  as King David said, when I wake up, You are still with me!
The sun’s about up now, and with the light of dawn, my billions of cells, random thoughts, desires, plans, relationships, joys and sorrows all stand amazed in the reality that God still thinks about me, hopes for me, cares for and loves me…enough, certainly to have assembled me in the latter days of 1946 in my mother’s womb; and even more certainly, with his hands-on providence and presence today.
He’s still There!
For You Today
Take a walk through all you are today; check out the mud of your existence, along with the wind in your face as you’ve soared at times.  Even while you’re feeding the dog, He’s still there.
You chew on that as you hit the Rocky Road; have a blessed day. 

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[1] Title Image:  Courtesy of Pixabay.com

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