Wednesday Wonder

Wonder and awe.

We use these words when talking about God and God’s creating and creation quite often. In the Bible we often hear about the ‘fear of God.’ That actually meant holding God with awe, not actually being fearful as we automatically think now.

Great awe may have us slightly fearful since it makes us feel rather small and insignificant at times. Looking up at the sky full of stars, the Milky Way, the northern lights, has us thinking about the vastness of the universe and how small we are within that.

I remember a ‘Calvin and Hobbs’ cartoon that had Calvin doing just that, looking up at the vastness of a starry sky and yelling something like, “I am significant! Yelled the speck.” Creation sometimes leaves us feeling that. We are in awe of it all. We are in awe of the One who created it. We call that One, God. We are in awe of God and all God has, and is, creating.

In her book, Atlas of the Heart, Brene Brown, quotes Ulrich Weger and Johannes Wagemann: “Wonder inspires the wish to understand; awe inspires the wish to let shine, to acknowledge and to unite.”

Sounds a bit like faith, church even. We come with wonder and together we try to understand and relate to God, to Jesus, to the working of the Holy Spirit. We are also in awe of all of it, and we want to share so that same wonder and awe is shared by all. This wonder inspiring awe is what unites all who join us in worship.

Everything we do, we do for the glory of God, or should. In the midst of our wonder and awe we talk about God’s glory. When we use the word glory, maybe this is just me, but I think of something shining. My awe wants what relates to God to shine – for all to see. This wonder and awe we carry with us through our faith is bigger than all of us. We cannot carry it alone, so we share and watch it grow in the world around us.

Now, unfortunately, wonder and awe are also the response as I look around our world these days. And it is not the good kind, as it is when thinking about God. There are people who would say that this wonder and awe of what is more negative in the world outweighs all the wonder and awe we carry about God.

Perhaps, we have not allowed our wonder and awe to shine, acknowledge and unite, as the quote above says. If we did, might the world change? Yes, we can’t change the whole world, but we can change our own space in it. If we all did that to reflect the wonder and awe we have in our faith, imagine what the world might be and become!

Each week, I try to offer up something to wonder about. And some days, I am in awe about how the Spirit has been at work in what has been offered. As we keep living together as a community we discover wonder and awe at unexpected times and places. That is what can be so amazing about a faith community.

“Wonder fuels our passion for exploration and learning, for curiosity and adventure.” (Brene Brown in Atlas of the Heart)

May we let wonder do just this in our community of faith. What might happen in our small part of the world as we explore, learn, stay curious and allow ourselves to embrace the adventure that is life and faith?

Let’s do it. All for the glory of God in wonder and awe.