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| Photograph by Jeffery Berkes. National Geographic |
Tonight I witnessed and realized just how vast and beautiful and beyond all measure God's creations are. I was laying out on my deck starring up at the night sky. Above me were a meteor shower and more stars in the sky than I had ever seen in my life! Not only that, but the stars were twinkling so much that it resembled flashing Christmas lights. I stared up taking in this beautiful canvas of God's handiwork and thought to myself, 'who could possibly look up at this and not see that something or someone created it?'. I was immediately reminded of 2 verses. The first verse is Psalm 19:1 ~ "The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands". The second verse is Romans 1:20 ~ "For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities -his eternal power and divine nature - have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse."
From an early age I have been fascinated with art. I was always drawing, taking lessons, drawing comic books, and drawing characters from my favorite movies. When I was in High School I studied for 4 years under the best art teacher in the state of Mississippi and learned a great deal about art and a lot about life from this godly man. I saw amazing things happen in that art house, but the most amazing of all things was that the Holy Spirit was alive in there. Inside the art house was a dusty old radio that hadn't been touched in years, and it either played gospel music or modern Christian music. That music filled the whole house and gave the artists a sense of encouragement and peace as they worked on their art. Whether the artists were Christians or not, it still brought peace into the atmosphere. The major aspect of the Holy Spirit in this house was that my professor kept telling the students to focus not on what they wanted to create, but what the Lord wanted them to create. And when these young men and women actually took him seriously and prayed about it and gave their work over to the Lord, AMAZING things took place. Many artists learned to let go of their pride and instead redirect all compliments and praises to the Lord, who gave them the gift.
One of the things that I realized in all my years of doing and studying art is that there is always a creator, an artist that created the painting or piece of art. When you look at a piece of art, whether good or bad, you automatically think:'who did this piece?'. This question is asked because it is an obvious conclusion to come to: if something was created, then it must have a creator. When I looked up at this beautiful night sky, this masterpiece proclaimed the work of an artist. An artist unlike any other. An artist that literally had the whole of space and time as his canvas. This artist must be whoever created the universe. I believe in the God of Abraham, and have seen Him work amazing things in my life, because of that I am left with no other choice but to believe that He is the one who created the universe and this beautiful starry night.
In art you don't see something so uniquely beautiful and complex come about by accident. If a piece of art is intricate and detailed , there must've been a good artist that did it and poured hours of themselves into it. Ive seen enough to know that this beautiful universe, detailed down to the last atom, was created by a very great artist, an artist that makes Michelangelo and da Vinci's art look like that of a toddler. This great artist just so happens to be the one who took the blame for my sins and paid the full price of the penalty I deserve. This God is the one who is with me every second, of every minute, of every hour, of every day and encourages me and protects me. This is the artist that I admire most. This is the artist that I gladly serve. I am honored to call the great artist of the universe my friend.
