When I consider the universe and all the works of your hands, I reel at
the vastness of them.
I cannot comprehend the distances involved nor the vastness of the
myriad of galactic systems.
That deep sweep of space overwhelms me: the notion of billions of stars
in their countless and unsuspended dances takes the breath from my body.
Even in this, our tiny system within its starry spiral is
impenetrability; before the commencement of the boundaries measurable only in
multiples of the speed of light.
All of this and so much more sprang into being at your word: far beyond
it all, is the mystery of eternity.
All we can observe is but a shadow of the eternal Kingdom: yet even the
immensity of the observable universe is too bold and too beautiful for us to
begin to comprehend
We cannot know what beauty there is, but only guess: the exquisite
formations of interstellar gas clouds are the work of an imagination so
artistic that it cannot be lauded in human terms; it demands the acclaim of
unfettered worship
Worship that can, itself, soar into the heavens and turn every mystery
of those unknown realms into a mighty song of cosmic praise.
Worship that strives to express the immensity of the unknown; that
grasps at the inconceivable boundaries, knowing that it has to penetrate beyond
the deepest limits of the material creation.
O how very, very great this makes you, creator God! How far beyond the
reaches of our minds!
Almost any condition we could imagine must be contained in your created
order. What lofty splendours burgeon in worlds of low gravity? What spectacles
of tininess adorn the dense cover where gravity is strong.
What beautifies worlds of intense heat and what spectacular barrenness
clothes the unthinkably cold planets?
Because they all sprang from your hand they will be beyond our most
vivid dreams, glorious and harmonious as are all your wonderful works.
So utterly beyond the boundaries of carping, grasping humanity, which
has sown so many seeds of destruction in this minute corner of your vast
creation.
Yet for all this wilfulness, all our unwillingness to be caught into
the drama of the worshipful invitation to consider the works of your hands, you
love every one of us as we build our self-bound edifices. You forgive us for
not setting ourselves free in flights of Creator-praise.
Forgive us our blindness to the vastness, O Lord: forgive us our
unwillingness to gaze on your goodness and adore you: forgive us our wilful
exclusion of You from Your creation.
Then, Lord, in that mercy, which stretches even beyond the known and
the unknown, lift the scales from our eyes, the pettiness from our minds, the
self-erected walls from around our souls and set us free to worship you and to
broadcast your incomprehensibility to the very gates and frontiers of Heaven.
O, the inexpressibility of it all! For your creation is so much greater
than the limits of language!
Set us free to worship in a language beyond the immensity this little
canticle tries so haltingly to express, O God, our creator, redeemer and sustainer.
If you like this form of prose-poem, you might enjoy Little Canticle 124 or Little Canticle 46 or if you came to this blog hoping for rhyming verse, Stars and Planets Sing Your Glory and Awesome, Wonderful Creator may be more to your liking, both being written to sing. A more comprehensive viewing of all the Little Canticles on this blog can be accessed HERE
If you like this form of prose-poem, you might enjoy Little Canticle 124 or Little Canticle 46 or if you came to this blog hoping for rhyming verse, Stars and Planets Sing Your Glory and Awesome, Wonderful Creator may be more to your liking, both being written to sing. A more comprehensive viewing of all the Little Canticles on this blog can be accessed HERE
