Come and see what God has done

Beloved of God,

    I want to remind you that we’ll be spending some time together Sunday for lunch during our second Sunday potluck. Our theme for this month is “Stuffed Stuff”. Eggrolls, Chicken Kiev, Turducken, Jalapeno poppers…Anything with something inside another thing is welcome. We’ll plan to eat shortly after Sunday School ends at 11:45 am.

    If you own a budget line for this current year and have not yet done so, please send in your submission for FY 2023 as soon as you can. We’re trying to get a jump on this so that we can exercise wisdom and care as we finalize the budget in December.

Our Scripture reading this week is from Psalm 66, the first part of which makes some grand statements about God: 
Psalm 66:4 All the earth bows down to you;
        they sing praise to you,
        they sing the praises of your name.”
5     Come and see what God has done,
        his awesome deeds for mankind!

The scope of all this is pretty grand, isn’t it? All the earth offers praise! Come see what God has done for mankind! It’s universal, even cosmic language. And then as we get to verse 6 we read this:
6     He turned the sea into dry land,
        they passed through the waters on foot--
        come, let us rejoice in him.

I love that the Psalmist is utterly unembarrassed to point out God’s cosmic power revealed in Israel’s particular story. He is determined to hold those two things together. There’s a lesson there. 
We can sometimes think of God as far off, managing creation and the human order at a level so high that we’re way down the list. Other times we know God as an intimate presence who is involved in even the minutia of our lives, and are content to notice his work in the detail with less attention for the grand, sustaining providential power exercised in the very preservation of the cosmos. 
I think we see God more clearly when we remember that He is not only sustaining the cosmos or tenderly watching His people, but that God is always doing both. In fact, in this Psalm, we see God’s glorious provision for humankind in the loving defense of a particular people. God’s grandeur is in the details, and God’s intimate attention is the very fabric of His cosmic providence. He is, indeed, all in all. 

Please join me this week in praying for: 

• Those among us facing hard moments with their parents.
  
• Those among us who are recovering from sickness, surgery, or injury.
• Any who may be traveling over a long weekend in our schools.
• Friends and neighbors in a season of grief.
• In thanks and praise for the good gift of rain. 
• fellow citizens affected by hurrican Ian.
• Those who respond to emergencies on our roadways, in our wildlands, in our communities, and even in our homes.
• Those in positions of public trust at the federal, state, and local levels.
• Each other (please email [email protected] if you’d like to be added to our prayer ministry).

You are the salt of the earth; you are the light of the world,

Marshall 

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