Once lit with festive Christmas lights, my neighborhood is now growing dark as lights are being taken down one yard at a time. There’s a little stab of sadness in the return to the plain and ordinary. It’s the loss of the wonder and mystery of Christmas that pains me. But I, too, will soon pack away the decorations and lights.
Wonder is so easily squelched by the routine, mundane, bizarre, and the tragic. This past year, nearly every vestige of it has been stomped out of us. But I want to keep it alive in my heart.
Wonder is the sense of awe that stirs the soul when magnificent truth beyond our capacity to comprehend is encountered. It sweeps over me when I experience the breathtaking mind-warping grandeur and majesty of God’s creation. As Job said, it causes the heart to pound and leap from its place. (Job 37:1)
I was a scuba diver in my younger days and water skied once. There’s a heart-pounding exhilaration in the spray and whipping wind as one zips over the water pulled by the power of a speeding boat, but the only wonder I experienced that day was the wonder of surviving. I much prefer the quiet depths of the water and the wonders beneath the surface.
Slipping into the depths of the holy Word of God, his Spirit stirs my heart with wonder as I ponder the breathtaking mind-warping magnificence of Truth. The greatest wonder that causes my heart to leap from its place is the unconditional, unwavering, inexhaustible love of God that embraces me just as I am in all my failures and leads me beyond them.
The Sovereign God who brings out the starry host one by one, and calls them each by name (Isaiah 40:26) died to save me from sin’s curse. Now he will never ever leave me, and every morning he calls me to follow him. Wonder of wonders.
What wondrous love is this, O my soul, O my soul! What wondrous love is this, O my soul! What wondrous love is this That caused the Lord of bliss To bear the dreadful curse for my soul, for my soul, To bear the dreadful curse for my soul!
Being a lover of the natural world, I follow Natgeo (National Geographic) on Instagram. A couple of days ago a photo of a gray whale taken by Florian Schulz in a Baja lagoon froze my scrolling.
Photo by Florian Schulz.
Florian is a professional photographer specializing in
wildlife and conservation photojournalism. This was his Instagram post:
“I was so touched by this whale mother. She moved so close
that I could reach her. She looked directly at me, and I felt we had a silent
conversation. No words, just observing each other. It gave me chills…there was
so much wisdom radiating from her gentle look….”
Several things struck me as I read his post and studied the photo. The first arresting statement was that the whale approached him and moved so close that he could touch her. These whales actually seek human interaction and seem to enjoy it. Then she set her gaze on him and lingered there. His reaction to peering into the deep eye of this massive creature looking back at him was a profoundly moving experience. He was awestruck by the wisdom and gentleness radiating in her look and it gave him chills. Lastly, there was a silent conversation between them – a communication of knowing beyond the language of sound. No words, just beholding each other.
Such an obvious segue to the God who reveals His divine
nature in the natural world:
The eyes of the Lord
are on the righteous, and his ears are attentive to their cry. Psalm 34:15
We have a very attentive God who desires an up-close-and-personal relationship with us and seeks it relentlessly. He sets His gaze on us, leans toward us and yearns to interact with us. He is always looking into our eyes, always listening to our voice, and always thinking of us. We are never out of His thoughts, out of His sight or beyond His hearing. Nothing distracts His persistent presence from us.
Charles Spurgeon wrote,
“He observes them with approval and tender consideration; they are so dear to
him that he cannot take his eyes off them; he watches each one of them as
carefully and intently as if they were only that one creature in the universe.”[1]
Selah – pause a moment and ponder the implications of that. Read
it again and linger over it. This both astounds me and humbles me when I reflect
on my sporadic attention to Him.
A personal encounter with the Living God, looking at Him looking back at me, is profoundly moving. This massive Being desires our companionship beyond what our intellect can grasp. But the knowing of the heart – the very heart of spiritual knowing – is living so close to Him that you can reach out and touch Him. Most of the time, there are no words exchanged.
This transformative knowing requires that we step out of ourselves and our preoccupations with the crises and demands of these shadowlands and soak our souls in the quiet depths of His unfailing everlasting love. When you drop the barriers in naked vulnerability and slip into His love, it will give you chills of the best kind and will utterly transform you from the inside out.
This knowing of God through a genuine living encounter with Him
comes from “sitting at the feet of Jesus,
gazing into his face and listening to his assurances of love for me. It comes
from letting God’s love wash over me, not simply trying to believe it. It comes
from soaking in the scriptural assurances of such love, not simply reading them
and trying to remember or believe them. It comes from spending time with God,
observing how he looks at me. It comes from watching his watchfulness over me
and listening to his protestations of love for me.”[2]
Spend some time, some days, soaking in the assurances of Psalm 139 and just behold Him.
Looking into the all-seeing eyes of the Holy God looking
into the soul of me, I anticipate reaction. But His eyes don’t widen in shock
or His brow furrow in disapproval, nor does He turn away in disappointment.
Incredibly, His heart melts in compassion and His eyes glisten with tenderness.
I am undone by unfailing, unflinching, unhesitating love and sink into the
eternal depths of the eyes of the Living God.
[1]
Spurgeon, Charles H. (1988). The Treasury
of David, Volume 1. Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers.
[2]
Benner, David G. (2015). Surrender To
Love: Discovering the Heart of Christian Spirituality. Downers Grove, IL:
InterVarsity Press.
