God Is Amazing: Color, Flavor & Laughter
I’ve been thinking lately about the ways that God loves us, takes care of us, shows us how amazing & trustworthy He is each day through the “common” details of life, details that we often overlook or simply take for granted as “just the way things are!” Below are three of these characteristics of life, three more reasons that we can be in awe of God just when looking at everyday life, three more distinctions of life that aren’t random/by chance but rather are examples of the loving/specific design of God:
COLOR
We don’t need colors in order to survive; God could have chosen to create the universe in physical shades of gray (not fifty!) and we would never know the difference! But He chose to create color, He chose to design the universe with a phenomenal amount of gorgeous hues that inspire us, take our breath away, and comfort/sooth us. Think about marveling at an awesome sunrise/sunset, think about God’s awesome creativity in the earth tones of nature, His attention to both detail & beauty in decorating the earth—blue skies, white clouds, green grass/leaves, golden wheat, brown tree trunks, rich brown and black soils—God has designed it all to beautifully match! Not only that, but God also gave humans an ability to creatively decorate with these various shades/colors in houses and buildings to help create spaces for rest, comfort, tranquility!
FLAVOR
Again, God could have chosen to feed humans with one tasteless pill per day that popped out of the ground; but instead He decided to give us spices, herbs, fruits, vegetables, and meats with flavor, along with nearly-endless combinations for mixing all of those together. He also chose to bless us with specially/intricately designed taste buds and senses of smells in order to experience (and ENJOY!) those different flavors when we eat! God CHOSE to make eating a pleasurable/enjoyable experience because He is the God of (holy) pleasure, He wants us to learn to enjoy and delight in Him, to taste and see that He is GOOD! (Psalm 34:8)
LAUGHTER
How amazing is it that God designed laughter, that God gave us the ability to erupt in physical and emotional convulsions—in a good way!—in certain situations we experience!?
Think about “getting the giggles” in situations where your mind knows that it is the worst time to laugh, but it’s as if your soul overrides your mind because it knows that you need to laugh hard at that moment to help lower the stress you’re facing!
- I remember cross country practice in high school: during serious team meetings, I would glance over at a friend (FIRST mistake!!!) who would of course make a silly face or perfectly imitate our dear coach and lip-sync what he was saying and I would simply lose it! I would drop to my knees to tie my shoes over and over again to hide my fit of laughter, and if the coach had looked down at me he would have seen my body violently shaking, literal tears all around my shoes as I wept in laughter over a simple contortion of my friend’s face at just the right time. Great memories! 🙂
Many of us know how good it feels after laughing hard—we feel relaxed, strangely exhausted, and less stressed—we just feel a little bit better, no matter what we are going through!
And like with God, there is a certain mystery to laughter—when we try to explain the situation to someone else later to try and get them to experience our same fit of laughter, it often doesn’t register with them—“you had to be there,” we say! Even watching the same silly YouTube video that busted us up the first or 2nd time usually doesn’t have quite the same effect the 9th or 10th time.
And of course there are times when laughter is not appropriate—God tells us in Ecclesiastes 3:4 that “there is a time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance.” Laughing AT someone often causes them pain, while laughing with someone can sometimes bring joy & healing…
But I’m bringing this all up because laughter is a part of God’s design—He didn’t have to give us the ability to laugh and give us plenty of healthy situations in life to cause beautiful laughter! But He did! Laughter is one of those many ways that God takes care of us, that God blesses us, that God shows that He is NOT BORING/STIFF/BLAND—He invented laughter, flavor and color—how amazing is GOD!!!??? That is the God of the Bible, and He is the only God worthy of our worship, our lives, to be called Father, Brother, Comforter, Savior and Friend…
And may we thank God, think of God, praise God and simply bask in the awesomeness of God the next time we enjoy flavor, color or laughter; may we learn to pursue Jesus, may we, by the grace of God, submit and surrender and receive Jesus as our Savior, may we learn to follow Jesus as our King, may we learn to be truly satisfied in Jesus, this Jesus Who has given us something even better than flavor, color, or laughter–He has given us Himself…
“The Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many”
(Matthew 20:28).