The real thing

Today: Jeremiah 51-52

Tonight I drove home into a painting...well, a God-designed painting of sunlight and mountains and oceans and clouds. It was one of those absolutely stunning days when God's creation was shining in its glory.

It's crazy to me that people think all the Earth's beauty popped up out of an explosion of gases. Today was one of those days when the creative force of our Creator was so obvious to me. Perhaps that's why this section of today's passage stood out:

By his power he made earth.

His wisdom gave shape to the world.

He crafted the cosmos.

He thunders and rain pours down.

He sends the clouds soaring.

He embellishes the storm with lightnings,

launches the wind from his warehouse.

Stick-god worshipers look mighty foolish!

god-makers embarrassed by their handmade gods!

Their gods are frauds, dead sticks—

deadwood gods, tasteless jokes.

They're nothing but stale smoke.

When the smoke clears, they're gone.

But the Portion-of-Jacob is the real thing;

he put the whole universe together...

I love that God is called "the real thing" (long before Coca-Cola!). He's not a created being, shaped by the hands or minds of man. He's the Creator--our master designer.

I also think it's interesting that this excerpt was included in today's passage--a section of the book of Jeremiah that describes the fulfillment of prophesy: the exile of God's people to Babylon. I love that through it all, God's creative design for humanity was at work. He was always there, always dreaming of the day His people would come home.

Tomorrow: Lamentations 1-3:36

Back to the start

(Originally written November 14)

Today: Genesis 1-3

Today was full of déjà vu moments. Yesterday, we talked about God as the ultimate Imagineer…and today’s story of Creation definitely illustrated that. I once again found myself on an airplane today showing…you guessed it… Julie & Julia (the movie that inspired this entire project).

In addition to the movie, my in-flight entertainment included a BBC-produced film about Yellowstone National Park. It was a piece tightly aligned with today’s passage in its illustration of the beauty and intricacies of Creation.

I don’t normally watch nature shows, but in light of the passage…and you may totally laugh or think this is ridiculous…I teared up on the airplane. It was just so overwhelmingly beautiful and obvious that the ultimate Imagineer was at work. I watched as a small beaver meticulously built his dam and stored food for the winter. His ability to defend his home and food from a (much larger!) moose was so simple, but so obviously God-given (he whacked the water with his tail and scared the moose away). The piece also profiled a bird at Yellowstone who took thousands of seeds from pine trees and buried them throughout the park as food for the winter. The narrator said that astoundingly, the bird would remember where he placed 700 out of 1,000 seeds (a 70% success rate). The forgotten seeds? Not forgotten by the ultimate Imagineer—they would grow into trees that would feed the animals for years to come and keep the cycle of life at Yellowstone in motion. How cool is that?

The short film about Yellowstone and the repeat of Julie & Julia moved me in many ways. It was like God was saying to me, “See—I didn’t forget about you, either. I see what you’re doing, what you’re thinking. I made you—and I love you so much more than that beaver and that bird. I’ll always take care of you.”

Please take that as a message for you, too…because it is (check it out here). Of all the incredible things in Creation, only men and women were created “in God’s image” for a relationship with Him. Don’t believe me? Check out today’s passage and go back to where we started from.

Tomorrow: Genesis 4-7