So That They Are Without Excuse

Sometimes I hear Christians tell people that they believe in God because of what they see in the creation. They will point to a bird flying and say something like "that's why I believe in God, his creation is so wonderful, it would take a wonderful God to create something so beautiful and graceful."

Possibly, they are referencing the verse in Romans 1:20 which tells us "For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse:"

So, we say we understand the beauty of a bird or a sunset or maybe a high mountain and we look in awe and try our best to give God the glory and praise for it all. Now God does get the glory for these things, as they truly are beautiful and amazing. His creation is remarkable! The problem though is Christians always want to see things with their natural eye and frankly all these things we see are so commonplace to us now that the impact on non-believers is minimal.

This got me to thinking about this verse, if we read it carefully it tells us the "invisible things of him" are clearly seen. We talk about birds, sunsets and mountains but these are all things that we can see and this verse is telling us about invisible things that are "being understood by the things that are made".

This means we have an understanding of these things, as do ALL things that are made. Therefore we don't go to a classroom and learn about these things, we understand them instinctively, along with the rest of creation. So the birds, fish, animals and even the plants and insects have understanding, which basically means that they bear witness to these things naturally, through their actions.

So these invisible things, that we understand, include but are not limited to "even his eternal power and Godhead;" yet we think He is telling us to enjoy looking at his creation. Yet taking in all the natural beauty we totally miss the spiritual aspect, which is where our life is.

In our natural bodies is death, yet that is the first stop we always make when trying to understand the things of God. We want to run down and baptize our flesh, we want to see someone come to the altar, we want to bless physical Israel and on and on. Most look at the effect on the flesh first and many of those never consider the spiritual things, which again is where our life is.

All the things we do in our bodies, in the physical plane of existence, are death and will reap death and will burn. Our life is all about the spiritual. If the body can find a small portion of something that runs over from the spiritual cup then that is not a bad thing but even that will reap death which is the nature of the flesh.

We have it backward, instead of the body reaping a benefit of what the spirit enjoys we let our spirit feed on the crumbs of what our flesh understands and enjoys. That is why we look at the birds and try to make that fulfill this verse.

We are also told "that they are without excuse" so we will not be able to claim that we didn't understand, we will all be "without excuse". So while we can we need to look with our spiritual eye, since the spirit is where our life resides anyway. So let's try to see it from that perspective.

Think of a seed, how it must die before it can achieve its true nature. Unless an acorn falls to the ground and dies it can not sprout into a great tree. This is true of all seeds, they must die. You see their empty husks break open as the life inside sprouts into what it was designed to become. This is the same in our lives as our flesh must also fall away and die before our true self can spout into its fullness.

Again, a caterpillar must be changed before its true nature can be revealed and it becomes a butterfly and more creatures do this before they attain their full adult nature. We see the shadowing of these things in nature and they are "clearly seen" and understood by us and even the lowly caterpillar bears witness.

Further, our natural bodies get dirty. We must shower each day to keep the filth off of us, just as we must wash clean our sins by the blood of Christ. We must eat to nourish our bodies just as we must eat of the Word of God in order to nourish our spirits.

We also see the Godhead, which is the understanding of the trinity in our lives. Most of us have several different titles such as a man who begins as someone's son, he will then usually becomes someone's husband and eventually he will be someone's father. This acknowledges the eternal Godhead of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, the same way we are fathers, sons and husbands. These things are natural to us and yet most people never even think about it.

If you see what these examples in nature tell us about the invisible things of God, you can further understand that even in the "non-completion" of these things the Lord is glorified. For we know the path is narrow and few there be that will find it. 

Therefore we see that not everyone attains the titles of father, son and husband. Not every caterpillar turns into a butterfly, nor every acorn into a tree. If you don't take a shower you will stink. If you don't eat you will die. It is clear these things don't have to be completed. In fact we can say that the great majority don't make it to the fulfillment of their true purpose.

Unfortunately, the great majority of people in the world will not find the straight and narrow path either. Yet there is one thing we all must do. We all sleep and we all wake up, there is no getting out of that.

We can only stay away so long then we shut down and nothing can stop it, after we sleep we wake up again, there are no exceptions, the whole creation goes through this. Just as we will all one day, good or bad not withstanding, be resurrected and stand before God. Sleep is a reenacting of death and the resurrection is reenacted by waking again, and not just the resurrection of just but also of the unjust since the whole creation does it. There will be two resurrections and no one gets out, you will go to one or the other, there are no exceptions.

These things are naturally understood yet most of us never think much about it. Imagine standing before God and he explains how you acted out the resurrection every day of your life. He explains that you filled the role of the Godhead in your life, you showered away dirt and filth from your body, you watched butterflies and saw acorns grow into large trees and somehow you never caught on to any of these "invisible things of God".

So, the creation truly does understand these things. They are ingrained in us at our innermost beings, they are natural to us and ultimately we will all be without excuse.