Through Painted Deserts

Have I mentioned that Don Miller is an excellent writer? There are a few passages I couldn't help but share with you because my heart raced when I read his descriptions of God.

I wonder at what Paul said back in Portland, how God is good, how it doesn't do any good to run from Him because what He has is good and who He is, is good. Even if I want to run, it isn't really what I want--what I want is Him, even if I don't believe it. If He made all this existence, you would think He would know what He is doing, and you would think He could be trusted. Everything I want is just Him, to get lost in Him, to feel His love and more and more of this dazzling that He does.

I've read poems that have made my heart race. I've read scenes in novels that have caused me to close the book, set my head in my hands, and wonder how a human could so brilliantly orchestrate words. But nature has never inspired me until now. God is an artist, I think to myself. I have known this for a long time, seeing HIs brushwork in the sunrise and sunset, and HIs sculpting in the mountains and the rivers. But the night sky is His greatest work.

I think the woods, being away from all the clingy soot of commercialism, have taught me life is enormous, and I am very tiny in the middle of it. I feel, at times, like a droplet of water in a raging river. I know for a fact that as a grain of sand compares in size to the earth itself, I compare in size to the cosmos. I am that insignificant. And yet the chemicals in my brain that make me feel beauty when I look up at the stars, when I watch the sunset, indicate I must be here for a reason. I think I would sum it up this way: life is not a story about me, but it is being told to me, and I can be glad of that. I think that is the why of life and, in fact, the why of this ancient faith I am caught up in: to enjoy God.

The stars were created to dazzle us, like a love letter, light itself is just a metaphor, something that exists outside of time, made up of what seems like nothing, infinite in its power, something that can be experienced but not understood, like God.

Relationships between men and women indicate something of the nature of God--that He is relational, that He feels love and loss.

It's all metaphor, and the story is about us; it's about all of us whom God made, and God himself, just enjoying each other. Months ago I would have told you life was about doing, about jumping through religious hoops, about impressing other people, and my actions would have told you this is done by buying possessions or keeping a good image or going to church. I don't believe that anymore. I think we are supposed to stand in deserts and marvel at how the sun rises. I think we are supposed to sleep in meadows and watch stars dart across space and time. I think we are supposed to love our friends and introduce people to the story, to the peaceful calming why of life. I think life is spirituality.

And if these mountains had eyes, they would wake to find two strangers [Don and Paul] in their fences, standing in admiration as a breathing red pours its tinge upon earth's shore. These mountains, which have seen untold sunrises, long to thunder praise but stand reverent, silent so that man's weak praise should be given God's attention.

It is a wonder that those exposed to such beauty forfeit the great questions in the face of this miraculous evidence. I think again about this small period of grace, and thank God for it, that if only for a season, I could feel the why of life, see it in the metaphor of light, in the endlessness of the cosmos, in the miracle of friendship. And had these mountains the ability to reason, perhaps they would contemplate the beauty of humanity, and praise God for the miracle that each of us is, pondering the majesty of God and the wonder of man in one bewildering context.

Those were the words I fell asleep to last night. I've sometimes wondered why people can keep writing and singing songs about love, and why people can keep singing about God. After all, even if we could convert every single word in the Bible into song, there would come a time when we will sing the last words in Revelations. I suppose the reason is that God is infinite, and since God is love, love is infinite, and we can keep trying to fathom Him, praise Him, and indeed, the words would never cease. Indeed, we may even fall silent, humbled at the thought that God would even pay us any attention.