Wish Upon a Star
When I consider Your heavens, the work of Your fingers, the moon and the stars which You have ordained, what is man that You take thought of him and the son of man that You care for him? Psalm 8:3-4 NASB
Take thought – David spent many nights under the stars. Without the disturbance of electric lights, air pollution and man-made distractions, he must have been overwhelmed at the sheer immensity of the heavens. He looks into the depths of space, sprinkled liberally with the dust of angels, and asks the question that every man must ask: “God, why do you even care about me?” We are so insignificant. A speck on a speck circulating around a speck in the unfathomable darkness. God paints a canvas so large that by any scale we are nothing more than a single pixel of color in a multi-billion-bit collage.
But David knows that God considers us. More than that, He cares for us and for our children. “To take thought” is the Hebrew word zakar. It has a wide range of meanings. One group of meanings covers careful and deliberate mental activities. Here zakar can mean, “to think about, to meditate upon, to pay attention to, to remember, to recall.” Every one of these meanings has significance for us.
David is stunned by God’s careful consideration of human beings. After all, God is responsible for some pretty big operations. God has created some pretty big things. And God is involved in some very big projects. It hardly seems reasonable that God would have time for me. It’s like expecting the President to call me up to see if I had a good breakfast this morning. Except that God is the President of the Universe. How likely is that?
God not only thinks about us, He actually deliberately and carefully considers everything about us. Did you notice that every one of the meanings implies an intimate interest in the matter? God meditates upon us – He brings us to mind in order to contemplate our lives, carefully examining every facet of who we are, arranging His thoughts about us in order to completely understand us. God pays attention to us – He doesn’t just give us a glance. He doesn’t just nod our way. He stops and focuses His attention on us. He looks carefully to see who we are and to listen to what we say. He settles down to meet us. God remembers us – He brings us to mind as He looks over His favorite photos. He thinks about the special moments He had with us. He reflects on our history with Him. He smiles over us. God recalls us – He brings to mind the call He sends to us and recalls it again. He contemplates the intimacy of His efforts to send us love messages. He calls us back. He re-dials because He wants to hear our voices again.
These are actions of deep affection. Saying that God “takes thought” about us is another way of expressing His love for us. It’s quite amazing, isn’t it? Imagine it. God cares about you.
Topical Index: zakar, take thought, care, Psalm 8:3-4
Amazing and wonderful thoughts about our
amazing and wonderful Creator. Thanks, Skip.
I think we make the gods of our psyches. We see our psyches hiding (starting paradigm) so we invent gods (belief systems) that we feel we are hiding from. In a flash, the Garden pair went from looking forward to their evening appointment to convincing themselves that God was Someone to hide from. The capricious, self-centered and malicious gods of the heathen are all ones we don’t want to notice us (unless we have them sufficiently manipulated, of course). The demons which reside within the psyche of the modern humanist are sleeping dogs we want to let lie, too. To be noticed by our power Source is apparently terrifying to us who are trying every way we know how to control that power for ourselves.
There is a saying that we hate all those we hurt (or manipulate). There is not one congenial relationship fallen man has with any source (motivation) of power he has to employ to exercise his choices with. I think it is because we have convinced ourselves that power is a: bad but b: necessary for survival. We know we have to have power to exercise our choices by means of; power that we must cooperate with or at least be able to control; so we cut deals (control by mutual manipulation) with the devil (the adversary) at the crossroads (choice points) at midnight (hiding). No, we don’t want to be seen by the powers that be!
I think we really don’t want God to notice us, either, UNLESS we think we are either manipulating Him successfully or have Him in a safe box (THEN He can notice us – on our terms, of course). No, we don’t really want Big Daddy beaming down from space counting hairs on our heads or reading the intents of our wicked hearts we are hiding even from ourselves. We don’t even want Him noticing our needs and deficiencies either, so we continue to just justify them to ourselves because to have God pity us we have to give up feeling sorry for ourselves. To have Him care for us we have to cast our care on Him, and THAT’S TOO SCARY!
I suspect all false belief systems are about putting God in a box and justifying ourselves in our bushes because otherwise we would have to admit the truth that we need His power to run on and His forgiveness to set us right with reality and, to get that, we have to hand over our self pity and self justifications and self empowerment that we are manufacturing behind those bushes, in the darkness of our own despair. Wait: does that even make sense? We must be crazy! Nope: back to the bushes!
Laurita, “Back to the bushes” you say. The only problem with those “bushes” that we hid behind is that they are full of poison ivy, poison oak or poison sumac and the longer we stay the more we come in contact with the oil, “urushiol”, (it even sounds Hebrew) and the more uncomfortable we become. If we thought we could hide from YHWH He has a way of not only finding us, but giving us a subtle hint not to try to hide in the bushes ever again. But if you are like me, I always forget what the plant looks like (is it leaves of three or plants of four) and before I know it I am itching and *itching. Another reason I don’t get out much. I don’t know if hiding in bed is much better than hiding behind a bush, except it itches less and both YHWH and my wife always know where to find me. I do need to get out more. What else can I hide behind?
Michael, you have been convinced that life is all about you: we all have. You are not special(ly tormented): you can just see your bush a little better than those of us who are (may be, somewhat) ‘higher-functioning’ self-centered lunatics. We all need a purpose to give us the incentive to face the demons: we all need a larger devotion than that self. It’s not about us!
We hide in the bushes of addictions (yes, I have been addicted to my bed, too) because that is the closest we can come to devotion in our flesh. We devote ourselves to anything we believe (religion) can keep us ‘safe’ (it’s all about safety, remember). Any bush will do, and there are no special bushes, and, yes, we all have them. These days in this culture, the biggest bush on the market is the self of humanism: we self-focus in an attempt to get love.
Obedience is about devotion to God instead of to our addictions. We have to repent and trade them in, which means that we have to identify the lies we are believing (trusting in) and repent for that false religion. Many days, I, too, put my bed where God should be. It is hard to trust Him enough to obey larger orders about stuff bigger than me and trade in my addictions of choice for His purpose for my life. It’s just as hard all the way, but at least I do know (by experience) that, when I change what I am believing (trusting), my motivations can change, too. As you know, the devil hates to be laughed at: including the demons our addictions are. It helps to go looking for the absurdity of the ‘reasons’ you are falling for when you fall back in that bed.
P.S. As I have shared before, the world’s foremost expert on energy, Ari Whitten, says that our hormones are built on our relationship with light. When we obey the laws of health (one of them is getting out in the sun: particularly the morning and evening sun’s ultraviolet rays) we can rebuild our body responses; including our hormones, like melatonin. Do you really want to get out of bed? Respecting the fact that we were built to have a relationship with the sun could be a good place to start – when you are ready to get out of bed, that is. What are you looking to for safety (hiding) these days? Hiding behind God instead, is a suggestion. Some days I can even remember it (may I remember it today)! Yesterday was sure a flop!
Correction: infrared, not ultraviolet light is the healing spectrum!
I think we make up gods (power sources) that match our paradigms. When the Garden pair went from looking forward to their evening appointment to hiding in the bushes, they hid because their belief systems had been changed to match their new paradigm. They had invented a god they ‘had’ to hide from. There is not a false belief system on the planet today that does not seek to hide from, (mutually) manipulate, or otherwise ‘control’ the power sources it must cooperate with to make choices. False religions are all about justifying our bush reality as well as manipulating our power sources. There is not a (false) god out there that we want to have notice us (without proper prophylactic tactics, of course). Life in the bushes is all about cutting deals (mutual manipulation) with the devil (power sources not of God) at the crossroads (choice points where we must employ spiritual cooperation of some sort with a power from beyond us; either of love or of some other motivation) at midnight (hiding).
Nobody wants to be seen! Why? Because we are in the bushes and how embarrassing is that? We would rather have gods of the darkness than have to come out where we know we are seen. We would rather feel sorry for ourselves than have our brokenness revealed to (even a) pitying God. We would rather make excuses for ourselves (in our self pity, which is one of those bushes) than repent for the brokenness so that we can justified by God ( which is simply to be reconnected with all again). We don’t want to be put back out WHERE EVERYBODY (INCLUDING OURSELVES!) CAN SEE US! Who wants to be seen? That means we have to repent of (trade in) the bushes (wrong motivations) we are hiding behind for the light – the nakedness – of having our motivations (love, which is connectedness) out in the open.
God’s care for us entails that we step out of the bush of casting all our care on ourselves. Is that really good news? Nope: back to the bushes of stinking thinking (God doesn’t REALLY care about me!) and morbid motivations (self-justification, et al) for us!
1 John 4:19
“We love because He first loved us.”
Amazing words of comfort, assurance, hope, and love!
As a Roman Catholic, I used to address YHWH as “God.”
When I became a born-again Christian, I addressed Him as “Lord.”
After discovering His life-changing, life-giving torah, I now call Him “Abba.”
It’s been an amazing journey! Learning His torah…what He expects of me…made me feel so loved by Him. He has not left us second-guessing how we can be pleasing to Him after all! He cares for us enough to give us clear directions on how to go back home…to Him!
Thank you for caring enough to share your awe-inspiring insights, Skip!