Roaring Godstuff

A nineteenth-century British author wrote that the universe is filled with roaring Godstuff, and it rolls over and through us all the time. Many people deny its existence. I used to be one of those who questioned, but now I understand that God is true, faithful, loving, all-powerful, and all-present.

One of the most puzzling questions of our time is how the universe was created. Those who believe in the roaring Godstuff understand that God created the universe. The Bible says he did that in six days and rested on the seventh day.

Were those seven days literally seven 24-hour periods? No one knows. The Hebrew word for “day” can mean “a day,” “today,” or an indefinite period of time—“a time.”

According to this linked site,

The source of energy, matter and the universe itself is the ultimate mystery of, well, the universe.
Based on a widespread afterglow called the cosmic microwave background (and other evidence), scientists think that the cosmos formed from a "Big Bang" -- an incomprehensible expansion of energy from an ultra-hot, ultra-dense state.

Describing time before the event, however, may be impossible.

Still, atom smasher searches for particles that formed shortly after the Big Bang could shed new light on the universe's mysterious existence -- and make it a bit less strange than it is today.

Here’s what happened, according to Genesis, the first book of the Old Testament:

In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.

He created light, space, the sky, time, land, water, and vegetation in the first three “days.” Then in the fourth “day,” he flung stars and planets aloft—that sounds like it could have been the Big Bang. It can’t be explained, any more than the mind of a human can recreate a picture of the Spirit of God hovering over the formless dark water.

But what I do know is that In the beginning, God—



 The picture comes from this linked site

To You I Do Pray

Here I sit, determined to write something. I think about writing all the time, and I want to write. I seldom do any of it right now. The piles of papers, books, and boxes call to me, saying, Here we are, find us a place. They pull at me, fussing to be tended immediately, clamoring at me to forget everything else until they are put away. Moving is a messy, long-term project.

Tonight I am ignoring the piles. I will tackle them tomorrow.

I find myself thinking about the picture I put on my desktop background today—it is a small snip of a mural covering a wall somewhere in New Orleans. My daughter took the picture in June when she and her two oldest children were there with a youth mission trip.

Central to the picture is Psalm 5:2, written in bold black print: Give attention to the sound of my cry my King and my God for to you I do pray. 

A little research showed this verse to be from the English Standard Version of the Bible, with a couple of variations. The ESV wording has commas after “cry” and “God,” and the last three words are “do I pray.”

Give attention to the sound of my cry my King and my God for to you I do pray. Without commas, it seems more intense, as if the writer were deeply involved, his heart crying out to God in great need.

The verses surrounding it are incomplete in this picture, but they all concern praying. They are written in different styles, as though all by different people. Everything is written in black except the word “pray,” the word scattered throughout, in red in differing formats. It calls to my heart—pray, pray, pray.  

Prayer is filled with power as it draws upon the mighty strength and love of God. I am called to pray by these words. God’s peace will fill me as I heed this call. Even though we are surrounded by piles of frustrating and difficult things, our hearts cry out: Give attention to the sound of my cry my King and my God for to you I do pray.