Our culture says you are worthless. At its best, it tries to place our value in human effort, and winds up leaving us empty. But you are special. You are of immense value. Here’s why.
God is.
A good God created a good earth with good things in it. He created a good and effective way in which all things work together. And, He created man—who was made in God’s own image, valued by Him, and into whom God breathed life.
A friend of mine, Brian, told me of sitting under the stars and contemplating the vastness of the universe. Suddenly, he envisioned all that vastness—stars, planets, galaxies, nebulae, all that is out there—rushing toward him and entering into him. It made him aware that the God who was magnificent enough to create all of that had made that very choice! In all His vastness, He somehow can condense Himself to come and indwell each of us who will yield our hearts—our innermost being—to Him.
Yet there are those who refuse to accept that. For whatever reasons, they choose to not honor Him as God. They do not realize the great gift He offers, the depth of His love, the beauty of relationship with Him, and are not grateful or thankful for even their own existence, much less His.
Granted, this magnificent, invisible, Creator of all things is hard for finite, foolish minds to comprehend. And so, in an attempt to appear wise and intelligent and not admit their limited understanding, they come up with alternatives. Primitive man came up with lesser gods, more like themselves. They made gods in their own image, understandable gods—like the sun, moon, rain, thunder, animals, emotions—created things. Some kept the idea of a god above the other gods in the background. Native Americans had the “Great Spirit.” He wasn’t particularly the object of their worship and rituals, but he was always there in the background, and out-ranked the sun and moon and other deities. Native, aboriginal Australians had “Atahocan.” In back of all their mythology, that included stories about the sun and the moon being the halves of a baby chopped in two, or a heavenly cow being milked to make the rain, was a spirit being who judges men by spiritual standards.[i] And, yes, monotheism predates polytheism.
Modern man tries to be even more sophisticated and wise. He rejects all religion, or accepts all, thereby emptying all of value or meaning. Instead, he makes a religion of atheism and/or science. Rather than accept that God is, man postulates that somehow all that is came to be by the chance collision of whatever atomic or subatomic particles inexplicably existed and were floating around untold billions of years ago. It takes an incredible imagination and an even more incredible leap of faith, but somehow, they find it easier than having faith that God is.
God is.
“In the beginning, God….” There is a certain amount of irony in the first phrase of the Bible. God, the eternal, never-beginning and never-ending God, picked a point at which to make a beginning and create. He created all that is tangible and temporal and not eternal by speaking it into being out of nothing. He just spoke. He said it, and it was so. And those sound waves are still flowing out across what we call the universe and causing it to continue to expand.
In his attempts to deny God, modern man must also deny man, at least in the sense of the eternal value God placed on man. As a result, pagan religions devolved to human, or even child, sacrifice. Cult prostitution, the moral devaluation of both male and female prostitutes, became a part of many man-made religions. Ritual killing in warfare was also valued. Amoral man values man like the dust of the earth. They see man as the problem. Mother earth takes precedence over Father God. Animals are valued as equal to man and therefore man must be inconvenienced or even suffer in deference to “protecting” other species. Man should care for other species as part of having dominion over the earth, but not as being subjugated to or of lesser value than all other life-forms.
God is.
God created man. He created Him with the stamp of His own spiritual likeness, breathed into Him life. He made him to have dominion over the earth, and with the creation of man, His creation went from “good” to “very good.” God took the dust of the earth, formed man, and poured into him His life and image.
If I try to carry this further, I will get off subject before I really get on subject. The point is: God exists, i.e., God is. That has got to be the starting point. Hebrews 11:6 says, “Without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is and that He is a rewarder of those who seek Him.” You must have some level of faith that God exists in order to be willing to seek Him. Then, what is the point of seeking something you cannot find? You must have faith that He will reward your search by being found by you. He is a rewarder of those who seek Him. You can know God. You can find God. God wants to be found by you. Seek Him.
[i] G.K. Chesterton, Everlasting Man, Kindle e-book edition, pg.101
