From Creator to paschal lamb

I have just returned from a brisk walk that changed my whole mood. After having to fork out about $1300 a couple of days ago for a new refrigerator after our old one crashed without warning, I was a bit down. While I was walking, a number of lorikeets flashed by, screeching their unique screech as they passed overhead. I heard magpies and butcherbirds caroling, and kookaburras laughing. A flock of cockatoos wheeled high overhead, their harsh, raucous cries carrying clearly through the autumn air. My thoughts turned to the almost infinite marvels to be found in nature and I felt elated as I remembered their Creator. Before going on my walk I was perusing some recent copies of the journal "Die Naturwissenschaften" (it's in English - I'm not that clever) and got so excited by all the fascinating insights into the mind of God found in them. I'm thrilled beyond my ability to express to contemplate the handiworks of God. I can hardly wait to read "Mushroom harvesting ants in the tropical rainforest". If God deemed them worth the bother of designing and creating, shouldn't we consider them worth knowing about? How sad I feel for evolutionists who are blind to the infinite genius of the true First Cause and worship a clever singularity that, fortunately for us, accidentally exploded.

Then I pondered the staggering connection between the wonders of nature and a man who walked this earth two thousand years ago. He who taught in the temple, stilled stormy waters, healed the sick and raised the dead, and then, at the end, willingly offered Himself as our atoning sacrificial lamb, was in some manner directly involved in making all things (John 1:3, Col. 1:16). He who was delivered up to a horrible death by priests of His own appointing knows all about supernovas, gamma-ray bursts, dinosaurs and mushroom-harvesting ants. He saw fit to walk this earth for over thirty years as our Father's "user-friendly interface". I can hardly believe it.

Stop and think. The physical creation is merely the backdrop and stage for the plan of salvation. Jesus Christ is salvation's executor. What He did two thousand years ago carries more eternal significance than the creation He wrought billions of years earlier. The universe will pass away; His words (and works) will endure forever (Matt.

24:35). It logically follows that what Jesus did back then is. well. vaster in scope than all of creation. His every word and His every deed throbs with unlimited meaning and significance. Ponder John's words:

And there are also many other things that Jesus did, which if they were written one by one, I suppose that even the world itself could not contain the books that would be written. Amen (21:25).

John meant what he said. And just as the creation reveals more and more wonders as investigators tease it apart through observation and experimentation, Jesus' every recorded move and saying yields up more and more richness as one ponders them prayerfully. I absolutely revel in studying the creation, but my limited intellect prevents me from understanding so many of its "miracles". Many people understand enough about Jesus to have saving faith, but nobody can have full comprehension of even His recorded words and deeds, let alone of all those things He said and did that we know nothing about yet. The atoning work of Jesus Christ must be immensely rich in scope; the wisest of believers can at best trace its outlines.

I for one can hardly wait to enter the kingdom of God; I'll have plenty of time to explore every nook and cranny of earth and universe, to attain understanding of all there is to know about atoms, galaxies, rocks and deep-sea worms. But that's small change compared with what Scripture reveals as the ultimate content of "so great salvation" (Hebrew. 2:3) - to walk and talk with, eat and drink with, and even be served by, Jesus Christ (Luke 12:37), to get to know and understand the full meaning of His words and deeds of two thousand years ago, and to learn about all those unrecorded things spoken of by John. I can hardly wait to hear Him "color in" the black and white sketch provided by the gospels of His Passion and atonement. My puny brain simply cannot cope with such excitement overload. And then. and then. after an eternity of fellowshipping with God through Jesus Christ, the time will come when we will be "ready" to spend the rest of eternity seeing more and more of God's infinite glory (Rev. 22:4). No, no, it just can't be true. But it is.