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Morning Devotion for the Season of Lent
March 28, 2026
The Meaning Filled Universe
We are all materialists now. As children of this current scientific era, we experience things around us as if they were nothing but collections of inexpressive and indifferent particles offering no opening for feelings of inner kinship with material nature. We seem to have little choice but to perceive ourselves existing within an unliving and impersonal landscape of alien, mind-independent things. Further, the explanatory resources provided by science for making sense of the world we live in, including our own bodies, consist, at bottom, of little beside cause and effect relations expressing the necessities of universal law. As a result, many of us are convinced that somewhere, somehow, an invisible and implacable necessity cruelly mocks our vaunted humanity.
Meditation: Jo Ann B. Jones
The above quote is found in “The Meaning-Filled Universe,” by Stephen L. Talbot in The New Atlantis, Spring 2026.
Read this now against the following statement: God is the omnipresent one who is the creator of the universe, who has brought about the existence of all that has come into being.
This first expression is depressing and hopeless. It mocks all of nature and necessarily, it mocks God. Totally absent from such a perspective is a theology of creation and of God as creator. There is no wonder, no joy, no sense of or need for connection and relationship, let alone enjoyment in them. What kind of life is this? What a sterile world - no sense of wonder in the beauty and richness of the world, the enduring and potent love felt in God’s presence. There is no depth or texture or variation of life. The tone feels utterly hopeless with no sense of relief.
Reading this article did immediately bring to mind my memory of taking a Sunday off from church many years ago so that I could simply sit in my garden on a Sunday morning - just sit and be… It was an unusually warm but not humid August morning accented by a gentle breeze. My garden fortunately is set back from Knox Street. There wasn’t much vehicular traffic that day, so I sat in almost total silence. I just sat and watched whatever presented itself to me. A few butterflies hovered over my flowers. A few bees buzzed around the plantings also, hovering occasionally over what had attracted them. It was so peaceful and I was content to let life in my garden carry on before me. And then a most unusual occurrence - I saw a blue hairy bug! Never seen before or since. My neighbor has often kidded me about this, seeming to think I had made this up. But, I have always held that in being still and simply being present to and taking in what nature had to offer to me on that quiet, beautiful and peaceful Sunday, something unexpected was given to me. I was surprised, thrilled and joyful. All because of the beauty of nature and my deep, deep gratitude to God the creator. I was humbled by this gift.
I am also constantly amazed by the extraordinary variety in creation. I am only conscious of and can recognize flora and fauna in my environment and perhaps much less broadly in the United States. Yet when I think of the world, the flora and fauna I have never seen there is a variety that seems almost endless. And I haven’t even accounted for the species that are now extinct. Who else could create this???? And why not assume an attitude and response of awe, wonder, joy and gratitude to what one finds in creation that certainly is not of one’s own doing? Such a bountiful provision of nature that is necessary and yet gives such joy and pleasure! What a deep and abiding sense of care for all.
A Prayer For Joy in God’s Creation
O heavenly Father, who has filled the world with beauty: Open our eyes to behold your gracious hand in all your works; that, rejoicing in your whole creation, we may learn to serve you with gladness; for the sake of him through whom all things were made, your Son Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
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