FBC Daily Devotional – January 24, 2022

Well, good morning to you. I hope you've had a good weekend and were able to worship with God's people on this past Lord's Day Hopefully in person with all of the

COVID and stuff going around. That's not a given these days nevertheless I'd also hope that you are doing well physically health is staying up there and You're keeping free of the

COVID crud or the the common cold or the flu or whatever is going around this time of year

I also hope you're doing well spiritually that you are nourishing your soul through the reading of God's Word and ingesting it taking it in and digesting it and Perhaps you're reading in our

Bible reading plan. So you read today in Romans chapter 1 verses 18 to 32 and one of the things that strike me in this passage is

Something I notice often when I go out for walks Like to walk in the woods

I like to walk along the Rock River not too far from where I live. There's a path Runs through the

Sinisippi Park and it connects to a bigger path that goes along the Hennepin Canal feeder trail

Hennepin feeder canal that takes you down to the Hennepin Canal Trail I mean you could go for a hundred plus miles on that trail if you wanted to I haven't done that much of it, but I have walked quite a bit in that area and It fascinates me just Just a casual observation at the hand of the

Creator verse 20 of our reading says this for since the creation of the world his

Invisible attributes God's invisible attributes are clearly seen Being understood by the things that are made that is by us even his eternal power and Godhead So a casual walk in the woods can speak to the human soul of the

Existence and the power and the wisdom of God I think at this time of year when you you walk through those those those woods and The trees are all bare and they look like they're lifeless and you you wonder man.

Could anything survive this? The ground is frozen and hard and yet sure enough in a few weeks

I'll walk that same path. The snow will be melting away. Some crocuses will be coming up through the ground and then a week or a couple of weeks after that some buds will break forth on the branches of the trees and the

Cycle will continue once again the same cycle that we see year after year after year testifying to the to the wisdom of God's creation and his power and Yet I was watching the other night a little video documentary on the

Andromeda Galaxy Which is one of the closest I think it's the closest galaxy to our own

But it's still I forget how many hundreds of thousands of light -years away

That I mean you can actually you can actually see the galaxy for it with a naked eye

If this guy is clear enough and it's dark enough If you and if you know what you're looking for Yet it is an immense Galaxy, and I was as I was watching this documentary.

I was just astounded by the immensity of it all and The the power that had to be involved in the creation of this of this galaxy, which is just one among Thousands and thousands millions,

I think of galaxies and in that one galaxy I if I recall correctly They said there are over a trillion stars

There was a trillion stars in one galaxy

Interestingly, they've pointed out that just even a couple hundred years ago it was thought that that galaxy wasn't a galaxy at all, but was just like a

Nebula within the Milky Way galaxy and Astronomers thought that there was nothing beyond the

Milky Way now. We know far more that Space just seems to go on endlessly and Yet you read in Genesis chapter 1 in the beginning

God created the heavens and the earth So if you look up in the sky in the nighttime sky at the vastness of space you can see you can hear in your human soul the testimony of creation as it speaks and says

God exists and he is powerful and he is wise and Yet this passage goes on To offer quite an indictment against the human heart because in verse verses 20 through 23 it goes on to say that We are without excuse because of what

God has created Because he goes on to say although they knew God They did not glorify him as God neither were thankful But became futile in their thoughts and their foolish hearts were darkened professing to be wise they became fools

I saw this on that video the other night where The the narrator was talking about how at one time there was nothing there was nothing and then all of a sudden there was something there was this big bang and And the the stars in the galaxy were flung out from this

Massive explosion that existed billions and billions and billions of years ago professing themselves to be so wise

They became fools was there at one time nothing. Yeah, absolutely in the beginning

But then God spoke it wasn't a big bang God spoke

But in our great wisdom, we think we know so much better But we changed the glory of the incorruptible

God Into an image made like corruptible man and birds and four -footed animals and creeping things we ended up worshiping the creature rather than the

Creator and it goes on to say that God therefore gave them up to uncleanness and the lust of their hearts to dishonor their bodies and so on and so forth and why

Why? What happened here that we he did such a thing?

because Professing ourselves wise we became fools and we have suppressed the truth

We've suppressed the truth you look on in the rest of this passage and you see all of the corruption of immorality the moral breakdown of the fabric of society and To what does the writer here

Paul attribute this He attributes it back to the denial of the

Creator We're seeing this lived out in Technicolor in our own day in our own age on the on the the news if you care to watch it the the unbridled, you know rioting and looting and Mayhem and murder and all kinds of immoral stuff that is going on in our culture

Why what's happened? We have eradicated the Creator If there is no

Creator, we're not creatures of creation We're just here because we happen to be here.

I actually saw a video that goes right along with this theme to of a montage of videos of young people primarily going to food restaurants food establishments and so forth and Protesting against cruelty to animals that are raised for food and There can be something said for the humane treatment of animals and I think they should be humanely treated but here's where I'm going with this the argument of some of the protesters was that this cow is

Being raped and having a child and is that child is is just being confined to a

Prison existence and he went on and and the protesters went on to argue even the sense that this baby calf is

Just as important as a human baby and yet we're slaughtering animals just so that we can eat them and what a terrible gross horrific injustice this is because after all the cow is just as Important and vital and worthwhile as a human being

One would wonder why that argument isn't applied to abortion wouldn't you but nevertheless

How do we get to that point? Where where a pig is a cow is a boy, you know, how do we get to that point?

we have Abandoned the Creator and if you get to the point where you see the the cow or the pig as equal to a boy or a child a young child a human being then you again conclude that we're just all animals and Where does morality come from?

Where does? social Structure and the fabric of society and Order and law, where does it come from?

Where does it come from? how bad the plight is for human beings when we suppress the truth of the

Creator's existence and his power and his wisdom So you who know

Christ you who have You who have ascribed by faith To the truth that there is a

Creator God who has made us and made us after his own image Give thanks to him because along with that goes a whole way of life that is is so much fuller and richer and More firmly rooted in eternal truth

Than if you deny him Our Father in our God. We do. Thank you today that You have not left yourself without witness that you have shown us in your creation as Well as through your revelation of you the revelation of your word that you exist that you are the all -powerful

God May we trust you? May we believe you? May we submit to you?

May we be your people this we pray in Jesus' name Amen All right.