Signed by God
Category : Lent Devotions
Isaiah 40:21-31
21 Do you not know? Do you not hear?
Has it not been told you from the beginning?
Have you not understood from the foundations of the earth?
22 It is he who sits above the circle of the earth,
and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers;
who stretches out the heavens like a curtain,
and spreads them like a tent to dwell in;
23 who brings princes to nothing,
and makes the rulers of the earth as emptiness.
24 Scarcely are they planted, scarcely sown,
scarcely has their stem taken root in the earth,
when he blows on them, and they wither,
and the tempest carries them off like stubble.
25 To whom then will you compare me,
that I should be like him? says the Holy One.
26 Lift up your eyes on high and see:
who created these?
He who brings out their host by number,
calling them all by name;
by the greatness of his might
and because he is strong in power,
not one is missing.
27 Why do you say, O Jacob,
and speak, O Israel,
“My way is hidden from the Lord,
and my right is disregarded by my God”?
28 Have you not known? Have you not heard?
The Lord is the everlasting God,
the Creator of the ends of the earth.
He does not faint or grow weary;
his understanding is unsearchable.
29 He gives power to the faint,
and to him who has no might he increases strength.
30 Even youths shall faint and be weary,
and young men shall fall exhausted;
31 but they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength;
they shall mount up with wings like eagles;
they shall run and not be weary;
they shall walk and not faint.
I consider myself to be one of the privileged few who gets to look through a microscope on a daily basis. It is astonishing to think there is a world around us that we actually cannot see with our naked eye. As I look at the cells I work with, it seems as though there is an unmistakable signature on them as if to say “created by God”. Everything in the cellular world has been laid out with such intricacy and every entity has a purpose. One cell in your body, for example, has many proteins, each with its own function. Believe it or not, there are proteins that are rotary motors, using energy to spin at around 100,000 rpm, and even proteins that walk on two “feet” to carry cargo from one end of the cell to the other. The DNA in your body encodes all these proteins, and if all your DNA was stretched out, it would equal 150,000 round trips to the moon!
Isaiah says, “He … brings out the starry host one by one and calls forth each of them by name. Because of his great power and mighty strength, not one of them is missing.” I believe just as God has named each star, he knows each cell and each molecule in your body and every organism on this planet. He holds it all together and breathes life into every molecule. If He can hold the universe, knows everything, and governs every reaction, why is it so hard to think He holds you? Does it not also mean that He hears every cry, every prayer and leads you into what is best for you? Let us choose today to not lean on our own understanding. Instead, let us remember that we are never abandoned but ever held in His everlasting arms.
God, your ways are higher than my ways. Remind me that You created all things and You hold all things together and my life is always in the palm of Your hand. Help me put my trust in You and know that Your plans for me are good. Amen.