Crazy Love

Stop Rushing into God's Presence: An excerpt from Crazy Love: Overwhelmed by a Relentless God
by Francis Chan

Stop Praying--Enter His Presence

What if I said, "Stop praying"? What if I told you to stop talking at God for a while, but instead to take a long, hard look at him before you speak another word? Solomon warned us to not rush into God's presence with words. That's what fools do. And often, that's what we do.

We are a culture that relies on technology over community, a society in which spoken and written words are cheap, easy to come by, and excessive. Our culture says anything goes; fear of God is almost unheard of. We are slow to listen, quick to speak and quick to become angry.

The wise man comes to God without saying a word and stands in awe of him. It may seem a hopeless endeavor, to gaze at the invisible God. But Romans 1:20 tells us that through creation we see his "invisible qualities" and "divine nature".

Let's begin by gazing at God in silence. What I want you to do right now is go online and look at the "Awe Factor" video at crazylovebook.com to get a taste of the awe factor of our God. Seriously--go do it.

Speechless? Amazed? Humbled?

When I first saw those images, I had to worship. I didn't want to speak or share it with anyone. I just wanted to sit quietly and admire the Creator.

It's wild to think that most of these galaxies have only been discovered in the past few years, thanks to the Hubble telescope. They've been in the universe for thousands of years without humans even knowing about them.

Why would God create more than 350,000,000,000 galaxies (and this is a conservative estimate) that generations of people never saw or even knew existed? Do you think maybe it was to make us say, "Wow, God is unfathomably big"? Or perhaps God wanted us to see these pictures so that our response would be "Who do I think I am"?

R.C. Sproul writes "Men are never duly touched and impressed with a conviction of their insignificance, until they have contrasted themselves with the majesty of God."

Switch gears with me for a minute and think about the detailed intricacy of the other side of creation.

Did you know that a caterpillar has 228 separate and distinct muscles in its head? That's quite a few for a bug. The elm tree has approximately 6 million leaves on it. And your own heart generates enough pressure as it pumps blood throughout your body that it could squirt blood up to 30 feet. (I've never tried this and I don't recommend it.)

Have you ever thought about how diverse and creative God is? He didn't have to make hundreds of different kinds of bananas, but He did. He didn't have to put 3,000 different species of trees within one square mile in the Amazon jungle, but He did. God didn't have to create so many kinds of laughter. Think about the different sounds of your friends' laughs--wheezes, snorts, silent, loud, obnoxious.

How about the way plants defy gravity by drawing water upward from the ground into their stems and veins? Or did you know that spiders produce three kinds of silk? When they spin their webs, they create sixty feet of silk in one hour, simultaneously producing special oil on their feet that prevents them from sticking to their own web. (Most of us hate spiders, but sixty feet an hour deserves some respect!) Coral plants are so sensitive that they can die if the water temperature varies by even one or two degrees.

Did you know that when you get goose bumps, the hair in your follicles is actually helping you stay warmer by trapping body heat? Or what about the simple fact that plants take in carbon dioxide (which is harmful to us) and produce oxygen (which we need to survive)? I'm sure you knew that, but have you ever marveled at it? And these same poison-swallowing, life-giving plants came from tiny seeds that were placed in dirt? Some were watered, some weren't; but after a few days they poked through the soil and into the warm sunlight.

Whatever God's reasons for such diversity, creativity and sophistication in the universe, on earth and in our own bodies, the point of it all is His glory. God's art speaks of himself, reflecting who He is, and what He is like.

The Heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of His hands. Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night, they display knowledge. There is no speech or language where there voice is not heard. Their voice goes out into all the earth, their words to the ends of the world. Psalm 19:1-4

This is why we are all called to worship him. His art, His handiwork, and His creation all echo the truth that He is glorious. There is no other like Him. He is the King of Kings, the Beginning and the End, the one who was and is and is to come. I know you've heard this before, but I don't want you to miss it.

I sometimes struggle with how to properly respond to God's magnitude in a world bent on ignoring or merely tolerating Him. But know this: God will not be tolerated. He instructs us to worship Him.

Go back and read the last two paragraphs, go to the website crazylovebook.com and watch the " "Just stop and think" video...meditate on the Almighty One who dwells in unapproachable light, the Glorious One.

There is an epidemic of spiritual amnesia going around and none of us is immune. No matter how many fascinating details we learn about God's creation, no matter how many pictures we see of his galaxies, and no matter how many sunsets we watch, we still forget.

Most of us know that we are supposed to love and fear God; that we are supposed to read our Bibles, and pray so that we get to know Him better; that we are supposed to worship Him with our lives. But actually living it out is challenging.

It confuses us when loving God is hard. Shouldn't it be easy to love a God so wonderful? When we love God because we feel we should love Him, instead of genuinely loving out of our true selves, we have forgotten who God really is. Our amnesia is flaring up again.

It may sound "unChristian" to say that on some mornings I don't feel like loving God, or I just forget to. But I do. In our world, where hundreds of things distract us from God, we have to intentionally and consistently remind ourselves of Him.