How Great Thou Art

Devotional for 6/25/11

This is a repost by Amie Spruiell from 2010

Everything under heaven belongs to Him and was created for His enjoyment

Have you ever gotten those circulating emails that have slide shows of award

winning pictures of nature?


Those spectacular views belong to Him for His enjoyment...

What about the ones that have pictures of those remarkably weird underwater

creatures that human eyes have never seen but have been captured by

technologically advanced cameras and what about the ones that we haven’t

seen?

They belong to Him for His enjoyment...

Sure He told mankind to rule over the creatures He made…the birds of the air,

the sea creatures, the land animals, and everything that moves, but He did not

create those creatures for the sole purpose to be ruled over.

They too were created for Him for His enjoyment...

I’ve read that there are 10 million colors that can be seen in a single viewing

condition, but multiply that by God knows how many different conditions and you

definitely have an infinite number of colors to experience.

That’s right. He came up with that for His enjoyment.

Nice that we get to enjoy it too!

And let’s not even get started on the number of possible musical sounds…a

piano alone could produce 8,400 possible chords.

He enjoys sounds…especially joyful sounds!

It gives me chills to think about an estimated 10 septillion stars…10 to the 24th

power stars in the universe. We’re told that the heavenly bodies are there for

signs and seasons, and they have worked well for signs and seasons especially in

the days of exploration, but we are now learning about their beauty. Thanks to

technology such as The Hubble Space Telescope, we can peek into a truly

breathtaking place in the universe. But for millions of people on our planet who

do not believe in the God of creation, it appears to them that space’s beauty has

all been in vain…existing for (how ever many years they might conjure up their

minds) with no one to enjoy it until now, and so they give thanks to technology

that finally it’s beautiful nebulas can be appreciated for “supposedly” the first time.

But God created it all for His enjoyment, and He’s been enjoying it since the

beginning! And He has allowed mankind to acquire the intelligence needed to

have a fractional glimpse of it…

How magnificent! How unbelievably glorious His creation is! But what’s even

more unbelievable is that the creation has no clue how great it is. Think about

that as you admire creation…it’s not possible for all of creation to know how

great it is. Not all of creation was given the capability of complete thought…of

reason, understanding, and appreciation…mankind alone was blessed with that

gift. Mountains do not know how high off the ground they rise, oceans do not

know how deep their waters stretch and stars do not know how numerous they

are. Colors and music cannot appreciate their artistic beauty. And although

many animals can enjoy comfort, process thought, and even mourn loss, they

definitely cannot reason with each other the vast “how’s” and “why’s” of the

mysteries of the universe.

We were created for God’s enjoyment and to enjoy His creation right

along with Him…even better…we were made in His image, the only part of

His creation to grasp and wrap our minds around how great it is!

Who can possibly think up the amazing biology of the ear, the eye, the nose, the

mouth, and the entire nervous system and connect them all to a central control

center to process the information coming in and going out through those

channels? We may be able to study and learn how it works, but only God can

conceive in His mind and create with His hands the physical image of Himself.

Of course we’re limited to an extent and cannot see all that He sees, hear all that

He hears, nor know all that He knows. We’re not God, but we are still in His

image. To those who are born deaf, they cannot comprehend sound. For those

who are born blind, they cannot conceive in their minds visual images or color.

The mind is only as good as what goes into it, but God’s mind needed nothing to

go into it in order for wonders to come out. And you are a wonder!

You were created for His glory 

even when you don’t feel or seem glorious

It sometimes seems like a curse to know so much…to know how your own

choices affect everyone around you…to know how it feels to fail…to know how

it feels to let people down, and to let ourselves down. To know how many

different ways we can mess up. It is a curse. It happened when the first man ate

from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. So, if that hadn’t

happened…would we all know how great we are? Must we have an

understanding of evil in order to have an understanding of good to the point of

calling it great? Pity how this knowledge of the bad gets in the way of the

knowledge of the good. We forget that we’re a greater design than Van Gogh’s

paintings, Beethoven’s symphonies, and Michelangelo’s sculptures. In God’s

eyes, we’re greater than the strength of the Tyrannosaurus Rex and more beautiful 

than the majestic feather design of the male peacock. We’re more amazing than

spewing volcanoes, and more important than splitting atoms. And yes, we’re

even looked upon with joy more than the unknown number of nebulas are looked

upon…nebulas that are thousands and even millions of light years away hidden

from the view of mankind for thousands of years and now captured through a lens

that transports the images back to earth so we can view what God has always

known was there and become awestruck by it’s magnificence. That which it 

does not even know it is.

But we are God’s masterpieces, not the nebulas!

We are so much greater than all of these things that He decided to step into

human flesh and become one of us. He did not become an animal, or a star, or a

tree. The One who created these wonders became one of us so that we can know

how much we mean to Him. He took our curse upon Himself so that His

masterpiece could be freed from the sin curse and to once again dwell with Him,

to worship Him, and to enjoy creation the way He intended us to thousands of

years ago. When He returns to take us home, He’ll allow us to enjoy with Him

what He created for His own enjoyment. Because He doesn’t want to enjoy it

alone…because He enjoys us the most!

How great Thou art! Everything under heaven belongs to Him.

He created it for Himself. He created us for Himself,

and He enjoys us immensely! How great Thou art! 

O Lord my God, When I in awesome wonder,

Consider all the worlds Thy Hands have made;

 see the stars, I hear the rolling thunder,

Thy power throughout the universe displayed.

When through the woods, and forest glades I wander,

And hear the birds sing sweetly in the trees.

When I look down, from lofty mountain grandeur

And see the brook, and feel the gentle breeze.

And when I think, that God, His Son not sparing;

Sent Him to die, I scarce can take it in;

That on the Cross, my burden gladly bearing,

He bled and died to take away my sin.

When Christ shall come, with shout of acclamation,

And take me home, what joy shall fill my heart.

Then I shall bow, in humble adoration,

And then proclaim: "My God, how great Thou art!"

Then sings my soul, My Savior God, to Thee,

How great Thou art, How great Thou art.

Then sings my soul, My Savior God, to Thee

How great Thou art, How great Thou art!

Written by Amie Spruiell