Finding Your True HomeSample

God the Cosmic Homemaker

In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth. . . . (v. 1)

All of us have memories of home. When asked about home, we often remember the house (or houses) we grew up in. The neighbors next door. The school down the street. The creek or lake or woods we explored as a child.

Or we speak of our current home: its place and inhabitants, its traditions and customs, its look and feel. Home is many things, but most importantly it is a place of permanence, a place where we dwell rather than merely live, a place saturated with identity-giving stories, a place of safety and rest, a place of hospitality, a place that we bodily inhabit and not just occupy, a place of orientation, a place of belonging.

The Bible begins with a story of home. A homemaking God creates a world for inhabitation. In days one through three God creates various habitats and in days four through six God creates different inhabitants for those habitats: the sun and moon for day and night, fish and fowl for waters and sky, animals wild and domestic and humans for the dry land. In other words, the Genesis 1 creation narrative is a story of creatures inhabiting their God-given homes. God is the cosmic homemaker, and heaven and earth are the home for all kinds of creatures. Praise God all creatures here below. --Steven Bouma-Prediger

As you pray, thank God, the maker of heaven and earth, for the gift of creation, and ask him to keep you always grateful to him, your creator.