A daily, Bible-based perspective of hope,
encouragement and exhortation.
Thursday,
November 15, 2018
Today's text asks four
questions that illustrate the awesome
greatness and almightiness of God. Let's
just consider the first question, "Who
has measured the waters in the hollow
of His hand?" Now I've got a
pretty big hand and I tried to see how
much water I could place in the hollow
of my hand. As hard as I tried I was
unable to hold a Tablespoon measurement!
But Isaiah says our great God "measured the waters in the hollow of His hand". I have no idea how anybody can begin to figure this out but I calculated, if my math is anywhere near correct, that's about 346,250,000,000,000,000 gallons. It might be easier for us to mentally calculate those 18 digits in the vast number I just wrote by realizing that 70 percent of the earth's surface is covered by water.
However that's nothing compared to the next statement concerning God's immensity. "With the breadth of His hand [He] marked off the heavens."
Now of course neither Isaiah nor I are asserting that God is a physical being. But as Isaiah made this imaginative visual picture we are much more likely to consider the immensity and greatness of our God. This is the mighty, awe-inspiring, supernatural God we serve!
In the verse immediately before, Isaiah launches into these declarations of God's greatness when he states that, "He tends His flock like a shepherd: He gathers the lambs in His arms and carries them close to His heart; He gently leads those that have young" (v. 11).
That's the greatness of our God! He is immense, beyond measure, as far as one galaxy is from another. Inaccessible to our view, and yet tenderly accessible to our soul 24/7 since His Spirit dwells within the heart of the believer. Let us stay faithful to Him today.
Be encouraged today,
Stephen & Brooksyne Weber
Daily
prayer:
Father, it is
commonly tempting to understand You in
human terms and measure your worth
such as Isaiah prolifically depicts in
his prophetic letter. When he
describes the means by which we, Your
created ones go about measuring, one's
ability falls enormously short of what
You, in Your divine nature, have done,
what You can do and what You will do.
We are unable to understand or
appreciate all that You do
because we are the finite created ones
and You are the infinite Creator.
There is nothing and no one who can
compare with You. You are the most
blessed, most glorious, the Ancient of
Days, Almighty, victorious, Your great
name we praise! Amen.
"Bigger Than Any Mountain" Video Homecoming Singers
What a blessing to hear Alexander Scourby read this chapter in the King James Version (Listen here)
Doctor Joe - We met some interesting people at the Kleen-Rite Car Wash show yesterday including Doctor Joe, who is a "towel doctor", lab coat and all! It's not everyday you get to meet people like Joe who has such an impressive degree! This was our second time to visit with Joe, and you can see by his happy smile, he exhibits a joyful disposition as we converse together.
Here's
another photo from Brooksyne's trip to Colorado last
week. She saw lots of snow in the mountains. We have
our first seasonal snow forecast today with the
first light snowflakes we have seen this season! But
just 1-3 inches are forecast at this time.
Click on photo to enlarge
Click on photo to enlarge
"God
Is Big Enough!"
Message
summary: Based upon our limited
perspective and understanding we may
tend to apply our notion of "bigness" to
God.
"Who
has measured the waters in the
hollow of His hand, or with the
breadth of His hand marked off the
heavens? Who has held the dust of
the earth in a basket, or weighed
the mountains on the scales and the
hills in a balance?" (Isaiah 40:12).
I am aware
that one must be careful about sharing
personal information or data on the
web but with her permission I will go
ahead and share that Brooksyne is just
short of 1,700,000,000 nanometers
tall. Now unless you find a nifty
online conversion widget to convert
this measurement it will seem like
goobly goop to you. In fact I don't
think I ever heard of a nanometer till
we visited the Intel Museum last month
in Santa Clara, CA. It is a
measurement used for extremely tiny
objects like computer chips. A
nanometer is a unit of length in the
metric system, equal to one billionth
of a meter.
Brooksyne couldn't remember my
taking this picture and when she saw
it she thought that the fab tech was
me dressed up in the clean suit! In
fact she told me I looked pretty good;
ten years younger and somewhat thinner
too!
Appraising
size, whether something is big or
little, is relative. After all, we would
all be very large standing next to an
ant but very small next to a whale.
Based
upon our limited perspective and
understanding we may tend to apply our
notion of bigness to God. An old gospel
song we enjoy is "How Big Is God?" Let's
also consider the song, "He's Got The
Whole World In His Hands" which may very
well be based on the daily verse.
Isaiah
40 is one of the most majestic chapters
in the entire Bible and in all English
literature for that matter.
Today's text asks four
questions that illustrate the awesome
greatness and almightiness of God. Let's
just consider the first question, "Who
has measured the waters in the hollow
of His hand?" Now I've got a
pretty big hand and I tried to see how
much water I could place in the hollow
of my hand. As hard as I tried I was
unable to hold a Tablespoon measurement!
But Isaiah says our great God "measured the waters in the hollow of His hand". I have no idea how anybody can begin to figure this out but I calculated, if my math is anywhere near correct, that's about 346,250,000,000,000,000 gallons. It might be easier for us to mentally calculate those 18 digits in the vast number I just wrote by realizing that 70 percent of the earth's surface is covered by water.
However that's nothing compared to the next statement concerning God's immensity. "With the breadth of His hand [He] marked off the heavens."
Now of course neither Isaiah nor I are asserting that God is a physical being. But as Isaiah made this imaginative visual picture we are much more likely to consider the immensity and greatness of our God. This is the mighty, awe-inspiring, supernatural God we serve!
In the verse immediately before, Isaiah launches into these declarations of God's greatness when he states that, "He tends His flock like a shepherd: He gathers the lambs in His arms and carries them close to His heart; He gently leads those that have young" (v. 11).
That's the greatness of our God! He is immense, beyond measure, as far as one galaxy is from another. Inaccessible to our view, and yet tenderly accessible to our soul 24/7 since His Spirit dwells within the heart of the believer. Let us stay faithful to Him today.
How
big is God! How big and wide His vast
domain,
To try to tell these lips can only start,
He's big enough to rule His mighty universe,
Yet small enough to live within my heart.
To try to tell these lips can only start,
He's big enough to rule His mighty universe,
Yet small enough to live within my heart.
Be encouraged today,
Stephen & Brooksyne Weber
Daily
prayer:
Father, it is
commonly tempting to understand You in
human terms and measure your worth
such as Isaiah prolifically depicts in
his prophetic letter. When he
describes the means by which we, Your
created ones go about measuring, one's
ability falls enormously short of what
You, in Your divine nature, have done,
what You can do and what You will do.
We are unable to understand or
appreciate all that You do
because we are the finite created ones
and You are the infinite Creator.
There is nothing and no one who can
compare with You. You are the most
blessed, most glorious, the Ancient of
Days, Almighty, victorious, Your great
name we praise! Amen.
Yesterday
we
visited the employees at Kleen-Rite
for a special car wash show with
vendors from various companies who
sell supplies and many car wash
owners. This is a good demonstration
of a clean, well-detailed antique car!
Many churches are participating in the
Operation Christmas
Child shoe box outreach.
Mount
Pleasant packed this old truck for a
very colorful delivery to the regional
collection center!
Our
first snow of the season!
Today's
Suggested
Music and Supplemental Resources
"Big
Enough" Video
Joseph Habedank
"How
Big Is God?" Video
John Hall We recall Big
John Hall (as he was known back
then) coming to sing at our
Bible College in the
mid-seventies.
How big
is God! How big and wide His
vast domain,
To try to tell these lips can only start,
He's big enough to rule His mighty universe,
Yet small enough to live within the heart.
To try to tell these lips can only start,
He's big enough to rule His mighty universe,
Yet small enough to live within the heart.
"Bigger Than Any Mountain" Video Homecoming Singers
"How
Great Is Our God" Video
Chris Tomlin
"I
Got Saved" Video
Corey Voss
What a blessing to hear Alexander Scourby read this chapter in the King James Version (Listen here)
Yesterday's
aerial photo was
over Baltimore's Inner Harbor!
Finally
today:
Doctor Joe - We met some interesting people at the Kleen-Rite Car Wash show yesterday including Doctor Joe, who is a "towel doctor", lab coat and all! It's not everyday you get to meet people like Joe who has such an impressive degree! This was our second time to visit with Joe, and you can see by his happy smile, he exhibits a joyful disposition as we converse together.
Send a message to Stephen & Brooksyne
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Scripture references are from The Holy Bible: New International Version. © 1984 by International Bible Society; NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE®, Copyright © 1995 by The Lockman Foundation, New King James Version (NKJV) Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. and the King James Version.
Personal Mission Statement: "I am created by God to bring Him glory. Through God's Son Jesus Christ I have been redeemed and make it my life's goal to please the Lord. My mission in life is to honor God through my faith and obedience and prepare myself and all whom I may influence for eternity."
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