A surprising take on a Commandment
I-70 just east of I-15
Growing up in church and Sunday School, I often heard “don’t take God’s name in vain,” which typically meant to not use God in swearing. So good Christians were careful, using “acceptable substitutions,” like “Gosh darn.” Pretty weak, but safe. Later, I learned that we missed it. Cursing fits within the command, but it goes deeper. We should not use God casually, without being aware of the respect and admiration and glory and transcendence that is innately in God. For instance, ever use the phrase “God told me…” or “God led me…,” without being 100% sure God was speaking instead of indigestion or your desires? That could be taking God’s name in vain, if he didn’t say what you thought. That kind of changes things.
Last July, I left Temecula to meet a long-time friend Rich in Grand Junction, CO, to do some riding through CO and NM. A familiar route for me, one I love…once I escape the desert before St. George. The best part came when I left I-15 for I-70. Anyone close by could have heard an abundant amount of “Oh Gods!” Not swearing, not at all. His handiwork awed me. I rode through Capitol Reef, with its intricately carved sandstone cliffs on both sides, ahead and behind. Different colored layers, laminated together through oceans coming in and retreating, thousands of times, with each visit depositing different minerals with their different colors. The weight of the upper layers often compressing the lower ones.
I made sure this was worship and not cursing, by repeatedly thanking him for this. Truly, one of the greatest worship experiences of my life—in absolute awe of the shapes and colors and complexity of his creation. Immersed in this majesty, I could only shout, “Oh God!” In worship.
Seeing creation and connecting it to the Creator is biblical, “what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse” (Romans 1:19-20). I left out the previous verse intentionally, wanting to first connect the two, of how nature reveals God’s power and deity. No human could create this, only a being that totally transcends our nature.
That means that people who look at the majesty of Capitol Reef or Yosemite or the Grand Canyon on the Hubble pictures of the cosmos have access to reality about God, and don’t make that connection, ignore some reality in their minds, “…the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness” (verse 18).
An earlier poem said it, “Behind the beauty is the source, you can’t have one without the other.”
Kick Starting the Application
Where do you most easily see the glory of God in his creation? How does that impact you? If you don’t follow Jesus, have you noticed that connection of creation and creator? Why or why not? What will you do with that?