Hello, and welcome to Enbolden, living a bold Christian life. I'm Chris Shutter, an ordinary Christian living with and learning about an extraordinary God. Thank you for joining me on spending 30 days of praising God. Hello, today's verse comes from Genesis 2-9.
The Lord God made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground, trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food. In the middle of the garden were the tree of life and the tree of knowledge of good and evil. Some time ago I said about trying to change myself completely. I told my friends I wanted to be more sparkly.
What that meant to me was someone who, when they enter a room, people instantly want to be around. Someone who's laughter draws others into their sphere. Someone who seems so light of heart and lacking in any strife. Someone who I said once practically poops out glitter.
Well, shock of all shocks. I realized that I'm just not ever going to be that person. So I decided if I'm not going to be sparkly, then maybe I should try to be elegant. You know, I absolutely love Pinterest, and you can ask it how to do anything and pop pops of bazillion articles on how to do it.
So as I was scrolling through one day, I kept getting all these traits of an elegant woman posts. However, after a recent theology night at my church, I decided elegant probably wasn't my bailiwig after all. After making some really goofy jokes and embarrassing myself in front of complete strangers, as usual, I realized I had failed just about every point in the elegant woman test. So you know, maybe God just wants me to be a better version of who he made me to be.
Now there's a thought. But in my short-lived quest of elegance, I noticed that God himself has actually created so much elegance in our world. The Merriam Webster Dictionary defines elegance this way. One, refined grace.
Two, tasteful richness of design. Three, restrained beauty. And four, scientific precision. So today I praise God for his elegant creations and his elegant ways.
But what do I mean by that? Well in looking at that list, what comes to mind are the everyday sunrises and sunsets of which he blesses our earth. A glorious butterfly that languishes on a leaf. A smooth and quiet breeze.
Or a gentle patterning of rain. There's so much to our world that really isn't necessary for sustaining life. Yet God not only made things good, he made them very good. Genesis 131 says, God saw all that he had made, and it was very good.
God is so elegant in the big things like sunsets, but also in the behind-the-scenes systems of how everything works seamlessly. Think about the entire process of our water cycle. Water evaporates from the ocean. As condensation is stored in the atmosphere, it creates ice and snow.
Water comes down to the rivers and groundwater. And the runoff goes back into the original source. It's so elegantly simple and precise and so cool. This God-Elegance isn't always what we might call beautiful.
Sometimes it seems terribly violent. Like a wildfire that rips through a forest causing destruction of trees. And yet that fire was also made by God. And it's a necessary step in another elegantly crafted ecosystem.
Now as inhabitants of this world, it's so easy to not see the minutia or even the bigger picture. We get trapped in our small daily lives of running errands and, excuse me, paying bills, raising kids, etc. We should all take time on a regular basis to stop and admire this elegantly crafted world. One day just lay on your back and contemplate the clouds.
Roll over and feel the life-giving dirt beneath the grass. Be amazed how the sea from that dandelion blows and lands to bury in the ground to create new life. And marvel about how very, very good it all is. Have an awesome day.
I'd love to hear from you and find out more about how you are living out your old Christian life. You can find me on Instagram at embolden-the-o or at my blog at embolden.net.