How Great is our God!

My good friend Pastor Darrell Garrett over on his blog, The Dawg Howse, mentioned today in his entry the worship song, “How Great is Our God”, by Chris Tomlin. It got me thinking about just how great of a God we really have. And as we read God’s Word in Isaiah 40, we get a good picture of just how immense and above us God really is. I heard a message recently by Pastor Tim Dilena of Revival Tabernacle in Highland Park, MI, where he spoke on the greatness of God from this chapter. You can hear his sermons at www.revivaltab.org. Check out some of these verses from Isaiah 40.

vs.12-“Who has measured the waters in the hollow of His hand, And marked off the heavens by the span, And calculated the dust of the earth by the measure, And weighed the mountains in a balance And the hills in a pair of scales?”

vs.15-“Behold, the nations are like a drop from a bucket, and are regarded as a speck of dust on the scales; Behold, He lifts up the islands like fine dust.”

It’s been said that the hollow of the hand is the little center part when the hand is cupped. God holds all of the earth’s water in the hollow of His hand! For us people, it’s hardly enough to wet our whistle, let alone quench our thirst. Think of the dust that gathers on your furniture. Could you possibly even begin to get an accurate count of each microscopic grain of dust? I think not, but God can. He measured out the dust of all the earth. He is some awesome, he knows every speck of dust, every grain of sand! And he should, he created it.

Think of the immense mountains, their sheer size. I remember when I was much younger, I was flying out west on vacation. Even at cruising altitude, the Rocky Mountains were huge! They seemed so big, even from several miles up. I remember the beauty and majesty of the Smoky Mountains several years back, as I was driving a group of teenagers back from a retreat in Knoxville, TN. When I was 17, I remember being in Washington State with my dad. We were blessed with great weather that week, and we hiked at the base of Mt. Rainer. What an amazing site! Yet, the sheer size of these great mountains to us is hardly anything to God. He can take these huge mountains of the earth and measure them out together.

He goes on to say that the nations of the earth are as a drop from a bucket. Just a little tiny drop. And like dust on a scale. I heard the illustration once of buying meat or cheese from a deli, and telling the person behind the counter that they need to wipe off the scale before weighing the meat, so as to not rip off the customer. Like that makes a difference? Yet, the nations are like that. God is so great! He is so far above us. When we hear this, and read it in the Bible, how can we not give him praise? But it gets even better.

The God who is so far above us is the same God who desires to be personally involved in our lives! I like what Psalm 147:3-4 says:

“He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds. He counts the number of the stars; He gives names to all of them.”

Look closely at this verse. What it is doing is describing the hugeness of God, in that he not only created the stars, he knows the exact number of them. When you think that the total number of stars in the universe is incalculable, it’s utterly amazing. And not just that, but God named each one as well! I at times can’t get my kids names straight! How great is our God! Yet, this huge God that simply spoke this universe and everything in it into existence cares about us. The God that is flung the stars into place is the same God that wants to heal the hurts in our lives! He cares about your pain. He is concerned with your welfare. He knows of your struggles and cares. He wants to be involved in your life personally. Perhaps that boggles our mind more so than declaring his greatness in creation.

So how do we respond to such knowledge? I, for one want to fall on my face and worship him with everything that is in me. Knowing how much God wants to be in my life makes me want to go deep in my relationship with him. So deep that even when the winds of adversity blow, I’m not blown with them, but moved by the depths of God. Knowing the God Almighty wants to have a real relationship with me makes me want to know him so much more. How many of us, if we had a chance to develop a relationship with someone we considered immensely important, would pass up the opportunity? For me, as a preacher, I would be foolish if I had the chance to get to know Billy Graham personally, to sit down and talk with him, and to glean from his wisdom, and passed it up. How much more the One who made everything? Get to know God!

We can read passages like Isaiah 40 and rejoice in the Majesty and awesomeness of God, but let us also remember something Jesus said: “If you have seen me, you have seen the Father” (see John 14:9). The Bible tells us that Jesus is the “exact representation of his (God’s) nature”. If we want to understand just how much God cares for us, and loves, we only need look to Jesus Christ.

I pray that this study today has been a blessing, and sparked a desire to know God more than ever before. And thanks to Pastor Darrell for poking me today with worship! It was your blog that got me going.

God bless!