Enjoying God in Everything

As we look around us, we should enjoy God. Practically anything can transport our mind and imagination from where it is to the pleasures of God. In childhood my parents taught me this simple principle as it related to nature. When we would drive through the country and see a beautiful scene, instead of simply saying how beautiful it was, my parents would reflect on God’s goodness, creativity, or kindness in giving us the opportunity. As a young boy, I learned to move quickly from what was in front of me on earth to what is true about God. In other words, taking the glory of God and connecting it to this moment of living.

What is true about nature should be true about everything in life. Rigney specifically uses baseball in this final chapter to explain how, for him, baseball becomes the conduit to help him enjoy God better. He explains it using four different ways that baseball does that for him.

Different than his illustration, let me give you three instances where it has happened recently in my life. First, nature. The fall/winter sunsets and sunrises in the Ozarks are just gorgeous. As I see them on most days, I allow them to take my mind to the glory of God as expressed in His goodness, creativity, majesty, and peace He offers in Christ.

A second example relates to Silver Dollar City. My family and I enjoyed walking around Sunday night at SDC. As I experienced the lights and decorations, I simply reflected on God’s character and creation. He made individuals in His image who have the capacity to create something as beautiful and gorgeous as SDC at night during the Christmas season. The lights and electronics helped me turn my attention toward God.

Third, as I watched a group of people enjoy each other, I reflected on the body of Christ. Laughing, talking, and just spending time together is not simply fun; those things reflect the plan, purpose, and ultimately the cross of Jesus Christ. To do those things together helps us worship Christ.

Everything in God

How do we do this? From what perspective do we engage the world around us? We engage the world around us through the lens of being in Christ. As disciples and followers of God, we love God and seek to serve Him, know Him, and honor Him in everything (first Great Commandment). We learn Him through His Word, celebrate Him through corporate worship, and seek to honor Him in our thoughts, attitudes, and actions.

The Apostle Paul describes having our mind set on things above. Further, our worldview flows out of our faith. As such, we take in the world around us, enjoy people, and reflect on life’s circumstances through the lens of our faith. In other words, all of life is lived in respect to our faith in God. We recognize and connect life to God, our relationship to Him, and our relationship to His people.

Rigney’s Summary: Make Imagination Serve Your Joy

So, you see, the exercise is not in vain. The fact that the mind of man has not conceived what God has prepared for those who love him doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t exercise our mental muscles, not as the fact that the love of Christ surpasses knowledge doesn’t mean that we should case trying to know it. Pushing the limits of our conceptions (provided we remember that they are only our conceptions) doesn’t threaten the joys of heaven. No one will be disappointed, least of all me. We work out our imaginations here so that we can, metaphysically speaking, give God’s omnipotent goodness a workout there.

So joys in the things of earth become joys in God when they are:

• 1. received and recognized as pictures of spiritual reality and on-ramps to spiritual virtues;
  2. shared with others as a way of loving them;
  3. wielded as a weapon in the flight of faith; and
  4. enjoyed (or grieved) as a way of anticipating the joys of the new heaven and new earth.

And that’s just a sample. There are countless variations and combinations of earthly joys, custom-made for each one of us, all designed as invitations from God to know and delight in him. Each joy individually, and all earthly joys together, are calling us to go further up and higher in to the life of the God of all pleasure.

When enjoyed rightly, they transform the idolatry and ingratitude of Romans 1 into the thanksgiving and adoration of the renewed heart. Every good and perfect gift comes down from the Father, and every good and perfect gift is designed to lead us back to the Father of lights, in whose presence is fullness of joy and at whose right hand are pleasures forevermore.

 

From Kevin:

Great summary. All earthly joys are rightly made to enjoy God better. When we recognize this, we learn better how to enjoy God in everything and everything in God. I’m grateful for Rigney’s book and taking what I have practiced since childhood to another level.