Do It Again!
Feb 19, 2020
In my childhood, during the summertime, friends and family members would spend their vacations with us at our country home in rural Washington. In addition to some great catching-up time, we would include visits to a standard set of local sites: Multnomah Falls, Beacon Rock, the fish hatchery, The Bridge of the Gods, and Dugan Falls.
As we made our way along, we would always take our friends to eat at a restaurant called “The Char Burger.” At the time, I thought it was magical because you could go through a line and choose your toppings. I realize now it was simply a glorified Fuddruckers. But through the lens of childhood, those kinds of things were still delightful.
I have so many great memories of visiting all of that natural and man-made beauty. And it never grew old, even though I had been to each location many times. It always felt like a celebration, and even like something new, because our visitors had never seen them before. And I was sharing in the newness with them.
Fast forwarding a few years to when I was a young mom, one of my favorite things was seeing the world through my three sons’ eyes. Just like enjoying the local sites with visitors, I experienced again the dynamic of everything being new from my boys’ perspective.
For them there was a refreshed energy about taking in the world. Kids don’t get bored by doing the same thing. If Alan would throw them into the air and catch them, you better believe the first thing they would say is, “Do it again, Daddy!”
These memories open me up to at least one way God must love us. Certainly, as an infinite being, God has been there and done that. Yet there is no evidence that God tires of his creation. What a gift it is to imagine that God takes pleasure and delight in the way each of us takes in the world…and that God never tires of us or our lives.
Just as I drew pleasure from visiting sites with friends and seeing the world anew through my son’s eyes, might not God be delighted to see the world through our eyes?
God has taken care to craft us in his image. What an amazing sensation it must be to share how seven billion people take in God’s own creation. It must be…delightful.
Many of us may struggle with thinking about God delighting in us. There are many reasons we could point to in our lives that may make that seem impossible. But here’s something to ponder:
“The Lord your God is with you,
the Mighty Warrior who saves.
He will take great delight in you;
in his love he will no longer rebuke you,
but will rejoice over you with singing.” (Zephaniah 3:17)
REFLECTION
- What do you delight in?
- Do you believe that God delights in you in that same way?
- If so, spend some time in gratitude.
- If not, how might you take one step toward opening to that reality?
“….God says every morning, "Do it again" to the sun; and every evening, "Do it again" to the moon. It may not be automatic monotony that makes all daisies alike; it may be that God makes every daisy separately, but has never gotten tired of making them.” (G.K. Chesterton)
You are, in fact, delightful. Let God express that to you today.
