Belonging to God (reprise VI)

When I think of belonging to God I think of giving myself to God. Although by rights every created thing belongs thoroughly to Him, God has given me the capacity to belong to Him by willingness. I have unceasingly the uncommon opportunity (who besides redeemed men and angels have this?) of offering my life by choice to my Heavenly Father, to serve Him, to praise Him, to cast my foolish weak soul into the ocean of His infinite mercy and wisdom.

When I walk the trails at the Springfield Nature Center (a sort of sanctuary for me) I have at times taken up two different views, both of them fertile for meditation. The first view is to look on all the trees and frogs and turtles and water and grass and recognize that all these things without exception continuously and faithfully fulfill God’s calling for them, in perfect unwavering submission to His will. It is only I and my fellow human travelers who rebel. Like a tarantula in the flour bin I stick out ghastily in the midst of an otherwise behaving creation. And as if that were not enough, this behaving creation is bent over almost double under the weight of a curse, a curse undeserved. My Edenic kin, those ancient gardeners, grew a spreading grass. This is a most sharp and humbling view to undertake.

The sharpness of this first view is inverted, but no less sharp, in the second view to which I have more recently come. And it yields a fuller fruit, I think. This second view is to consider that among all these trees and frogs and turtles and squirrels and flowers I encounter in my amblings, it is only I and my fellow human travelers who have been granted the prerogative of faith. Yes, as is evident from my first view, I and the rest of humankind are the singularly unfaithful specimens that are brushed by those breezes coming in off the water. We are the darkest blots on land or sea; and yet we have that exclusive invitation to bow our monstrous wills and seek forgiveness and new life in Christ. We have the privilege of choosing to give ourselves to God. And it is in our very weakness that God demonstrates this His greatest power and glory. The trees are majestic as they lift their arms in praise. The flowers unfold beauty in their appellations. All the rest of nature single-mindedly offers a sacrifice of pure devotion to the Creator. But only we sinners have the capacity to dazzle creation in shining with the brilliant redeeming glory of Christ. May our heavenly Father give us grace to shine that glory in love and holiness.