Episode #52 Get Inspired By God’s Creativity – For the Fun of It

Hey friends, have you ever just sat back to marvel at some of the almost impossible sounding creations that we have in the world? Today we're marveling with God at his creation, just for the fun of it. Hey, I'm Jen, and as a Bible teacher, I love to help people talk with God, and I especially love helping people engage in these uncommon conversations with God in everyday life. So today we're just marveling at a few unique aspects of creation.

The first one is the platypus, and you may know it by its other name, the Duckbill platypus. Think about this creature for a second. It's an egg laying mammal that is duck-billed with a beaver- like tail. It's otter-footed and it's semiaquatic. This creature has thick fur and venomous spurs. What kind of imagination? What kind of creativity creates the platypus?

Let's talk about clouds for a second. From our vantage point on earth, looking up, clouds look lightweight, just blowing along in the breeze. But according to the United States Geological Survey, the average cumulus cloud can weigh up to a million pounds, and there it is, just flying across the sky.

Here's another one. When the conditions are right to see a rainbow in the sky, even if we're all looking at the same rainbow, we will all see different rainbows. So, viewers on the ground, we can only see the light that's reflected by raindrops on the horizon. And so, because each of our horizons is a little bit different, and we're looking at the light as reflected through raindrops, one, no one actually sees a full rainbow from the ground. But two, no one actually sees the same rainbow. Each person has a different horizon to see the rainbow through.

And then my favorite animal is the Mantis Shrimp. I've never seen one in real life but I read about it online. I'll put links to these things, because this is science, in the show notes. Mantis Shrimp is a rainbow-colored crustacean. It's a shrimp, covered with beautiful rainbow colors. It also is beautiful to our human eyes, but the Mantis Shrimp itself can see colors that humans can't even see. So, I encourage you, google it, look at a picture of this thing. We're able to see those colors as humans because we have three color receptive cones in our eyeballs. And yes, my nerd self is geeking out over all of these things, and I love it because mantis shrimp have 16 color receptive cones. So humans have three, and with our three color receptive cones, we get to see the whole rainbow And mantis shrimp have 16 color receptive cones so they can see colors that we can't even comprehend, we don't have understanding or words for. Also, this shrimp can move its limbs so quickly that the water around it boils. And it's deadly. There's things in how it finds its prey and all of this stuff. God is so creative. His creation includes things that we are only beginning to understand in part, so let's take a minute and marvel at God's creativity and creation together. Why? Because it's fun, because we're thinking about God, the creator of all things, and we're appreciating his creation.

Another word for thinking is meditating. To sit in and think on the wonder of God and what he's created. We can let our thoughts dwell on all sorts of things, but right now we're thinking on and we're meditating on the wonder of God and what he's created.

I'm going to read for us from Psalm 104, and I would love to read the whole Psalm, but to be intentional with our time together. I'll read verses 1-3, 24, 25, and then 31-34. And it says,

"Bless the Lord, O my soul! O Lord my God, you are very great! You are clothed with splendor and majesty, covering yourself with light as with a garment, stretching out the heavens like a tent. He lays the beams of his chambers on the waters, he makes the clouds his chariot; he rides on the wings of the wind. O Lord, how manifold are your works! In wisdom you have made them all; the earth is full of your creatures. Here is the sea, great and wide, which teems with creatures innumerable, living things both small and great. May the glory of the Lord endure forever; may the Lord rejoice in his works, who looks on the earth and it trembles, who touches the mountains and they smoke! I will sing to the Lord as long as I live; I will sing praise to my God while I have being. May my meditation be pleasing to him, for I rejoice in the Lord."

I hope you've enjoyed these few minutes of marveling at God's creativity and thinking about his creation. Let's continue that conversation with him because we've hardly even scratched the surface. And here's our question:

God, please capture my attention. What's something else you've created that I can marvel at?

Have a good talk.

And if you've been encouraged by this content, please share it with a friend and help them grow in their conversational relationship with God too!

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