My God Who Fills Me

Romans 15:13

New International Version (NIV)

13 May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.

1 Timothy 6:17

New International Version (NIV)

17 Command those who are rich in this present world not to be arrogant nor to put their hope in wealth, which is so uncertain, but to put their hope in God, who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment.

C.S. Lewis, "Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer"

I have tried...to make every pleasure into a channel of adoration. I don’t mean simply by giving thanks for it. One must of course give thanks, but I mean something different. How shall I put it?

We can’t—or I can’t—hear the song of a bird simply as a sound. Its meaning or message (‘That’s a bird’) comes with it inevitably—just as one can’t see a familiar word in print as a merely visual pattern. The reading is as involuntary as the seeing. When the wind roars I don’t just hear the roar; I ‘hear the wind.’ In the same way it is possible to ‘read’ as well as to ‘have’ a pleasure. Or not even ‘as well as.’ The distinction ought to become, and sometimes is, im- possible; to receive it and to recognise its divine source are a single experience. This heavenly fruit is instantly redolent of the orchard where it grew. This sweet air whispers of the country from whence it blows. It is a message. We know we are being touched by a finger of that right hand at which there are pleasures for evermore. There need be no question of thanks or praise as a separate event, something done afterwards. To experience the tiny theophany is itself to adore.

Gratitude exclaims, very properly, ‘How good of God to give me this.’ Adoration says, ‘What must be the quality of that Being whose far-off and momentary coruscations are like this!’ One’s mind runs back up the sunbeam to the sun.

As our beautiful summer is giving way to our usual cloudy and rainy fall, I've been thinking much about the sun I shall soon miss.  There are few things lovelier than feeling the sun's warmth on my face.  I have to close my eyes and thank God for the gift, and as C.S. Lewis writes, I must adore the Giver.  It's the rain that persists through fall, winter, and spring that makes the summer so beautiful, leading to those moments of total awe of the Creator.  So I will praise the Giver of all good things.  He does love me so.

"Oh To Be Loved" - Thad Cockrell