The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands. Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they display knowledge. (Psalms 19:1-2, NIV)
The creation is one of the ways God speaks to the deepest longing of our heart.Golf is one of the few sports where the surrounding environment plays a major part in our enjoyment of the game. I often hear people I am playing with comment on the beauty of the course. It seems to bring out something joyful in our spirit when we experience the beauty of God’s creation, whether we recognize God in it or not.
Our verse today speaks to this seemingly universal experience. The creation is one of the ways God speaks to the deepest longing of our heart. We can try to pass it off as a sentimental feeling, but it clearly strikes a deeper chord in our soul.
It is difficult not to recognize how very small we are when we look at the magnitude of creation. It is also difficult to imagine how it and we came to be without acknowledging the possibility of a Creator. We have to recognize that we are utterly powerless to replicate anything like it.
If we are part of creation, it makes sense that we would in some way want to understand and know why we were created. The great philosophers all thought that there were three fundamental questions that everyone should ask themselves: What can I know? What should I do? What may I hope? If we can answer these questions, we go a long way toward understanding why we were created.
God speaks to us from creation by allowing us to recognize his power and majesty. He speaks to all who would seek after him from the written word in the Scriptures. In them we find his more specific direction for our life and his purpose for us. He most specifically speaks to us through the life, death, and resurrection of his Son Jesus. If we choose to believe what God has spoken through nature, the Scriptures, and the life of Jesus, we will come to know the answer to our fundamental questions about why we exist and what we should do here on earth. We will also know what we can hope for in the future.
We can immerse ourselves in the business of life and turn our minds off from these fundamental questions, but we will remain forever seeking after something that will satisfy our soul. We were made with a longing for heaven and the only way to get there is to find out from the One who created us exactly what we must do and how we should live. Every other option we use to pursue the answer to our heart will end up with the same frustrating thought: Is that all there is?
In truth, there must be more—we know there is. All we have to do is look up to the heavens where the glory of God is displayed.
—
Linda Ballard
December 7, 2017
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The Links Daily Devotional appears Monday-Friday at www.linksplayers.com.