Weekend before last I sat in a condo overlooking the Pacific Ocean and stared out at its waves. My view of the ocean was framed by the window molding. My simple mind might think the ocean exists only within the boxed area of my perspective. Yet standing in the surf, I’m dizzied by the rush of it around my legs and overwhelmed by its expanse and motion.
It’s too easy to define God from my boxed view and think He exists only within the parameters of my understanding. I attempt to make Him fit the predictable and comfortable. It’s hard to wrap my mind around something bigger than I can perceive and deeper than my surface perspective. It’s much safer to look at Him from a dry condo rather than stand in the dizzying rush of His power, off balance and overwhelmed by His endless expanse.
As I sat gazing out the window, I watched black cormorants bobbing on the surface of the sea, rising and falling with the waves and occasionally diving to catch a fish. One flew along the foamed-laced translucent surface of a cresting wave. It struck me that there are those who live out their lives flying through the spray of a cresting wave. They bob on the surface occasionally diving when need drives them deep. But they don’t live in the deep.
As I pondered the cormorants, my mind went to the whales who live and move and have their being in the sea. They move in its currents, are enveloped by its power, and sustained by its bounty. Their other-world songs echo in the depths. Humanity has been captured by their haunting melodies and study its complex compositions and evolving patterns. We wonder at their song.
Perhaps they sing for the joy of the song. Perhaps they’re humming to themselves, and perhaps they’re praising their Creator. Is that so outlandish? In Revelation 5:13, John wrote, “Then I heard every creature in heaven and on earth and under the earth and on the sea, and all that is in them, singing: To him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb be praise and honor and glory and power for ever and ever!”
O God, stretch the boundaries of my limited perspective. I don’t want to live out my life on the surface only occasionally going deeper. I want to be deeper, live deeper, and stay deeper. I want to feel the surge and rush of Your unrestrained power in my life, carried by Your currents of love, and fed from the bounty of Your depths. I want to live and move and have my being in You. I want Your Presence around me carrying me, lifting me, challenging me, and sustaining me.
As I prayed and pondered this, a distant spout of spray and a dark glistening back broke the grey-green surface of the sea. Then a great tail lifted and disappeared again into the deep.
…in Him we live and move and have our being. Acts 17:28