Enjoying God and His Gifts

I have been reading a tremendous book by Joe Rigney entitled, “The Things of Earth: Treasuring God by Enjoying His Gifts.” As the title suggests, Rigney is concerned with helping us to glorify and delight in God by enjoying the gifts He gives because He is the Creator of the good gifts and because something of God is reflected in and can be experienced by those very gifts.

Let me give you just a little flavor of the book:

“What, then, can we say about creation? Creation is a communication from the triune God. God loved his Trinitarian fullness so much that he created a world to communicate that fullness ad extra, outside himself. And not just any world–a world full of fish tacos, tickle fights, afternoon naps, Cajun seafood, back rubs, wool house shoes, and church softball.

“The infinite and eternal God created something that is not God but nevertheless really and truly reflects and reveals God….

“As a result, creation is glorious, created shafts of divine glory. As the light of the sun is refracted by water droplets into a rainbow, so creation refracts the glory of God, allowing the full spectrum of his beauty to be displayed for the knowledge and enjoyment of his people. Created glory mediates diving glory so that when we chase the pleasures up the beam to the source, we arrive at the joy of joys, the river of delights, the person of persons, the living God and Father of Jesus Christ.” (p. 74)

As we go about our days seeing, hearing, tasting, touching, moving, and relating let us not only give thanks, but observe and truly enjoy the gifts so that we may enjoy, experience, and know the Giver all the more!

“Oh, taste and see that the LORD is good!” Ps. 34:8 (italics mine)