Sunday, January 1, 2012

Experiment

Scripture Passage that caught my attention today: Genesis 2:19 So out of the ground the LORD God formed every animal of the field and every bird of the air, and brought them to the man to see what he would call them; and whatever the man called every living creature, that was its name.

Observation: God experiments.

Application:
Today is New Year’s day. Today’s assigned readings (Genesis 1 & 2 and Luke 1) reflect beginnings—the beginning of creation and the beginning of the new creation in Jesus. Of course, a new year serves as a new beginning of sorts for all of us as well. And all of life, in one way or another, is an experiment.

A few moments ago I read a little post by a fitness guru indicating that he was going to try an experiment for the next 30 days—eliminating a certain type of food/drink from his diet as some have recommended. Although I don’t have any interest or plan to replicate the same experiment myself, it did strike me as a good idea to conduct some personal experiments—whether for diet, exercise, behavior, or even in one’s profession/calling—in order to have a better chance of discovering better ways to live/serve.

So with that in my mind I read the passages assigned for today and noticed that God experiments too. In the second creation story (Genesis 1 and the first part of chapter two is one creation story is considered by myself and many scholars to be one creation story and then the rest of chapter 2 of Genesis is considered to be another creation story. Neither story is necessarily intended to be a scientific account of ‘how’ the world was created but, rather, an expression of faith in the ‘who’ behind creation.) we have this indication that God watched the first human interact with the animals and birds “to see” what the human would call them. That’s an experiment! It’s an intentional observation where the results are not known for certain in advance.

I’ll admit that it can be a bit disconcerting to think of myself, or my family, or even all of humanity past, present, and future as some sort of Godly experiment. Over the years it would seem that some of these experiments have, well, not gone so well. Free will has led to costly and even gut-wrenching mistakes time and time again. But it has also led to incredible demonstrations of love and grace—sometimes in the very darkest moments of time. Hence when God says, “Let there be light” there is light—enough to see through the midst of what will happen next.

Prayer:
Lord, as you watch us, help us to watch ourselves—to learn from our mistakes, build on our success, and be drawn ever more deeply into the heart and soul of you. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

(Readings today included Genesis 1 & 2 and Luke 1.)

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