God in Nature
Sermon Preached by Reverend Stuart Langshaw on Sunday, 20 October 2024.
God in nature based on readings for Pentecost 22.Job 38:1-7. Psalm 104:1-10, 26 and “How Great Thou Art”.
My heart sank when I looked the readings for today – from Job, where God takes Job to task and puts him in his place a bit . . . Psalm 104 about creation . . . the epistle to the Hebrews with its talk about Jesus as a priest after the order of Melchizedek . . . Mark’s gospel with James and John wanting places of importance in heaven. My prayer was “Help!” The good Lord said, “Oakie doakie – put together the Job reading and the Psalm – talk about the revelation of God in creation and nature.” I said – “Good idea, Lord. I’ll do it.”
In Jewish thought, Job is the concrete case to answer the question, “Why do bad things happen to good people?” Why do good people contract dreadful diseases . . . or have bad accidents . . . or have relationships that turn sour and become hurtful? Why do such bad things – and others – happen to good people who don’t deserve them? And for believers, where is God in all this?
In the book of Job in the Old Testament Job was a test case between Satan (the devil) and God. The devil was sure that, with enough bad things happening to Job, he could turn Job’s trusting God into Job’s despising God, because Job would become convinced that God either could not, or would not, protect him from the bad stuff.
As the rotten things happened to Job, he complained TO God, and complained AGAINST God, and complained ABOUT God. But not at the cost of his trust in God. He lost his wealth, he lost his children, he lost his servants, he lost his health. OF COURSE Job was affected by all this loss. Job had three friends who tried to comfort him with their advice – which wasn’t very comforting. So, Job talked and talked and talked, trying to work out the answer to his miserable life, and the apparent powerlessness of God to do anything.
This is where our Old Testament reading for today comes in. In our reading God spoke to Job, and God drew attention to the created world and the world of nature – the fact that God created the world of nature shows that God is all powerful, not the weakling that Job was arguing. “Where were you, Job, when I laid the foundations of the earth?” “Who laid the cornerstone of the world when the morning stars sang together? “ “Who shut the sea in doors (within its coasts and boundaries)?” and said to the sea “This far you will come and no further, and right here will your proud waves be stayed.”
The created world, the world of nature, shows that God is strong, and powerful, and not the featherweight that Job was arguing.
One or two of you here have been sailors and will testify to the power of the sea. One or two of us here are interested in astronomy and will testify to the beauty and the vastness and the complex nature of our solar system, let alone the universe. One or two of you here have been pilots and will testify to the power of the elements . . . wind, clouds, storms. One or two of us here have been – or still are – keen nature photographers, and will testify to the amazing beauty of the created world in your own photographs, as well as in those calendars that show amazing scenery.
And all of us, I am sure, have been to a beach or a valley or a mountain or a lake or a waterfall – and have found yourself uttering, as a person close to me once uttered “Isn’t God clever!” Just go out to the rose garden here at St Andrew’s, and look at the roses . . . sense their perfume, see the intricate details of their petals, feel the texture of the petals . . . take a rose apart and see its component parts – an internet site I looked at identified 14 parts of a rose flower. The world of nature shows power (as in Job); shows beauty; shows form and grace; shows design; shows the smallness of us humans as we face the strength and power of some manifestations of nature.
And if we are people of faith, in all this we can see God – God’s power, God’s strength, God’s intelligent design.
Our psalm this morning has been part of Psalm 104. Job was written to gobsmack Job with God’s greatness. Psalm 104 was written to expand on the human response, “Isn’t God clever!” The Psalm writer describes how the created world serves God’s purposes. “You have stretched out the heavens like a tent cloth.” “You make the clouds your chariot.” Verses 7 to 10 talk again about the sea and how God established the sea within its coasts and boundaries as the book of Job mentioned.
It’s all the things that caused another Psalm writer to say, “The heavens declare the glory of God, and the earth shows his handiwork.” (Psalm 19:1)
There is something within the human psyche – the human spirit – the human soul – that causes us to respond to the created world with awe and wonder. I am sure you’ve felt it several times in your travels. It’s a great feeling, a great response to what we see and what we feel at that moment. It’s a feeling to be treasured and remembered . . . and captured in photographs as much as we can.
It’s the feeling that motivated Stuart K. Hine to write his wonderful hymn, “How great thou art.” “I see the stars, I hear the mighty thunder, thy power throughout the universe displayed.” When I look down from lofty mountain grandeur, and hear the brook, and feel the gentle breeze …”. The response that we feel is expressed in this hymn in its wonderful chorus – “Then sings my soul, my Saviour God to thee, How great thou art, how great thou art.”
And it’s that very same feeling that fills us with despair and dismay when we see what we humans can do to creation – when we regard it as mere financial potential to be exploited for all it’s worth . . . when we see landscapes and cities reduced to ruin and rubble as a result of war. From feelings of awe and wonder and delight to feelings of despair and dismay and distress.
God’s creation should emphasise within us our need to be stewards of God’s world.
“Then sings my soul, my Saviour God to thee, “How great thou art, how great thou art.” “God’s greatness, God’s power, God’s design. And that’s where natural theology can take us.
Let us sing verses 1 and 2 and chorus of Hymn 13 in the church hymn book
O Lord my God, when I in awesome wonder
Consider all the works thy hand hath made,
I see the stars, I hear the mighty thunder,
Thy power throughout the universe displayed.
Then sings my soul, my Saviour God to thee,
How great thou art, how great thou art!
Then sings my soul, my Saviour God to thee,
How great thou art, how great thou art!
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 hear the brook, and feel the gentle breeze;
And what about God’s other characteristics – grace and love, God’s peace and acceptance, God’s seeking our friendship and fellowship? That does not come through reflecting on the created world, but through Jesus Christ – his life and his teachings, his death and his resurrection. God’s greatness and power are seen in creation. We are moved to awe and wonder by creation. God’s grace and love are seen in Jesus. We are moved to love and thanksgiving by Jesus. In order to come close to God, in order to experience the love of God, we need to commit ourselves to God through faith in Jesus Christ. We are moved to glad commitment and whole-of-life dedication by the life of Jesus.
It’s as though Job was battered into understanding God’s ability to help him in his need by being shown the “big-picture, dynamic God.” But we are drawn into understanding God’s desire to share our lives and to live with us and within us through the life, teachings example, death and resurrection of Jesus, God’s Son.
And it’s precisely this that Stuart K. Hine goes on to write his wonderful hymn, “How great thou art.” “And when I think, that God, his son not sparing, sent him to die, I scare can take it in. That on the cross, my burden gladly bearing, he bled and died to take away my sin. Then sings my soul – ‘How great thou art . . .’”
God’s creation of power …. God’s revelation of love. Nature’s vastness and complexity … Jesus’ love and grace. In a sense we need both, so that we can start to see the extent and strength of all that God can be to us, if we give our hearts and lives in glad surrender to him.
Let us sing hymn verses 3 and 4 and chorus of Hymn 13 in the church hymn book
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.
Then sings my soul, my Saviour God, to thee …
When Christ shall come with shout of acclamation
And take me home — what joy shall full my heart!
Then shall I bow in humble adoration,
And there proclaim, my God, how great thou art!
Then sings my soul, my Saviour God, to thee …
(Hymn composed by Stuart K Hine, 1899-1989)