The sound of birds calling and talking to each other is a comforting way to wake up in the morning. There are times in my life where I have lived in the heart of big cities and the sound I woke up to every morning was the go to work traffic at 5:30a.m. This was not a comforting sound. I’d much rather hear the birds. You see, my grandmother liked to watch birds, and she got me into it. I still use her binoculars when I want to see a bird in a tree, or a duck or loon sitting on the lake. When I see a beautiful bird, I often think of the scripture in Matthew 6:26, “Look at the birds of the air, that they do not sow, nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not worth much more than they?”
A little later on in Jesus’ sermon, He says in Matthew 6:28-29, “And why are you worried about clothing? Observe how the lilies of the field grow; they do not toil nor do they spin, yet I say to you that not even Solomon in all his glory clothed himself like one of these.” Guess what, this same grandmother was a gardener and also got me interested in gardening. Both bird watching and gardening have one thing in common, the appreciation and awe of natural beauty.
Most often these two passages are quoted to let us know how much God is taking care of us and that we shouldn’t worry. But today I want to focus on how Jesus compared His Father’s caring for us with the beauty of His creation.
God appreciates color
I’m just going to be very blunt here. Sometimes we humans are just stupid. We have spent so much energy in being racist because we wrap color up with different ways of cultural mores. Aren’t we ever going to get tired of this? Look around God’s creation, and that includes you and me. It is so obvious that God loves color so much that He painted His creations here on earth with more colors than are contained in the largest box of crayons. So why do we get so upset because some person’s skin isn’t the same color as ours? Personally, I have tons of freckles that make my skin many different colors given how much sun I’ve been exposed to. I appreciate the diversity of my skin, as we all should. It is way past time we get over our ignorant hatred of the different and learn to appreciate our differences as God made us each unique.
God is the creator of beauty
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, is a well-known quote. I found this to be true in some respects when comparing features of beauty with my good Chinese and Mongolian friends. We were looking at models one day and we decided to tell which model we thought was the most beautiful. We all picked different models. So, being the ever-questioning one, I asked, “Why do you think that model is the most beautiful? What features make her beautiful?” Of course when we all sat and really reflected on what we considered were the features that made a person beautiful, we were looking at different features through the cultural eyes we were brought up with.
God doesn’t look at beauty through culture. His eyes see pure beauty in everything He creates. It is His “cultural” eyes we need to develop and see the world through. We need to be able to see the beauty that is not on the surface, but deep within an individual, animal, the earth. Nothing even the most gifted person attempts to create can come close to what God creates.
How many times have you seen a beautiful picture of a scenic spot and say, “Oh, I want to go there and see for myself.” And then if you have the chance, you go, and that picture just couldn’t hold a candle to the real scene. Even as good as our cameras have become, that photo that it takes, still cannot represent every facet of beauty of the real.
God is the real
We are so fortunate as Believers to be able to experience life with the God who actually cares for us, loves us and takes care of us. He does this because He really wants us to be happy. There are so many gods out there that are worshipped who have no power. Their followers are only able to live life in grays because they haven’t experienced the vibrant life that we live through God’s faithfulness and power. Really, even many Believers are also living a gray life because they don’t believe in the ultimate power of our God. Jesus has told us above that God holds us dearer and clothes us in more miraculous colors than His earthly creations. If that isn’t an esteem builder, I don’t know what is!
It is our God who is reality, who loves us really and gives us our real purpose in life. Let’s make sure we are focusing on His reality for our lives. If we do, then our lives will be psychedelically colorful.
Photo credit: Dec. 9, 2017 Bill Schiess | EastIdahoNews.com, ©2015-2020 EastIdahoNews.com, LLC
