Drawing Near to Godნიმუში

Day 2: The Face in Front of the World

Read: Genesis 1:1-31

“In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth” (Gen. 1:3).

The secret of the world, said G. K. Chesterton, is to know that we only see the back of it. We see everything from behind; trees, clouds, planets, stars, oceans, everything. “Cannot you see that everything is stooping and hiding a face? If only we could get around in front” (from G. K. Chesterton's The Man Who Was Thursday: A Nightmare).

Behold, the face on the front of the world is God’s. That’s what this chapter in Genesis is about. Seeing only the backside of the Creation, we are tempted to think of it only in terms of space and matter.

Seeing the front, the face, as the opening chapter in the Bible does, we must sing. Whatever else Genesis chapter one is, it is a hymn of praise to the God who made all things. You can add your own embellishments to the song by singing of particulars. Does God say the birds and fish and livestock he created are good? You say, as you pray, the crows and dolphins and Hereford cows are good. Make up a tune as you go.

Imagine this chapter as footage from a time-lapse film of the Creation. Light bursts forth, waters separate and gather, mountains arise, forests spread, animals appear, millions of millennia dance and flash by.

Then the film slows down to real-time, and then slow-motion. A man and a woman stand naked and innocent, warm and glistening in the Love of God. God’s face brightens as he looks at something of himself gazing back at him. “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them” (Gen. 1:27).

Time to sing again. The words of Psalm 8 would be good: “When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and stars which you have set in place, what is man that you are mindful of him…? You made him a little lower than the heavenly beings and crowned him with glory and honor” (Ps. 8:3-5).

The next time you are perplexed, disappointed, and discouraged by another person, or yourself, remember you are seeing from behind. In front, there is a face Jesus came to restore to the Image of God (2 Cor. 3:18).

PRAYER: “There’s not a plant or flower below, but makes Thy glories known; And clouds arise, and tempests blow, by order from Thy throne; while all that borrows life from Thee is ever in Thy care. And everywhere that man can be; Thou, God, art present there” (from the hymn “I Sing the Mighty Power of God” by Isaac Watts).