March 31, 2017 WOG

Go God or Go Home

There are some phrases that I just really enjoy, one phrase is “Go big or go home”, while there is little hard fact about the origins of the phrase most believe it is from either the Surfer or Ski community that was adopted in the 90’s for a motorcycle part advertisement. Regardless of the origin it means to commit to doing something completely or don’t bother to start. While that philosophy can be debated as wise or not, I find it funny to say, mostly because I tend to be more like Eeyore from Winnie the Pooh.

I have been listening to a lecture series on my drive to work on the Attributes of God. One of the striking things about the lecture series to how it allows me to consider the absolute immensity and infinity of God. The entire series of lectures contains 6 hours of condensed content solely on considering who God is. I have listened to this series now for the fourth time and still find new profound insight. As I spend the time driving and consider the miles I cover each day just to get to work and how small of a distance that is compared to fact that it takes about the same time for the light from Jupiter to arrive on Earth. Then to try and comprehend the astronomical distance to other stars, other galaxies, all that is finite, has distance, has a beginning and will someday have an end.

Lord, you have been our dwelling place throughout all generations. Before the mountains were born or you brought forth the whole world, from everlasting to everlasting you are God. Psalm 90: 1-2

The Psalms so often talk about the mountains, about the stars, about the sand, all to describe the uncountable or the immovable things that we see and to try and use them to understand God. When I consider that we can approximate the sand on the earth, mathematically consider the number of stars, and know that mountains do change over time, it just makes God so much more immeasurable. We find more, try to understand subatomic particles, gaze into a dark spot in the sky with a telescope and all the sudden more emerges. We try to use those temporal things we see to try to give boundaries to our reality, but there is always more, and outside of all that is our infinite God. A God who will always be. A God who “is” even before the mountains, mountains that have been there for every generation without moving. A God before the stars, before the foundations of this universe.

To consider God is like being swept away by a flooded river, as one truth allows me to take a breath I am suddenly swept on by another and another. What wonder it is to behold the immensity of our God, big just doesn’t have the gravitas, huge is puny in comparison, all I can say is God “is”. In view of how small I am, how little I can do, it draws me deeper into the commitment to praise my God, that whole hearted commitment is far beyond big. I think I need to start saying “Go God or go home” instead.

– Jeff Gilbert

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