As believers, certain of the creative hand of God and the sovereignty of His ways, we have all had our “Wow!” moments with Him – on the shores that line the oceans, amidst giant redwood trees, overlooking the Grand Canyon, holding a newborn in our arms, delighting in the achievements of our toddler, hearing His voice in the darkness, awed by events drawn together by His orchestration. In Ann Voskamp’s One Thousand Gifts, Ann embarks on a quest to find God’s gifts within the ordinary, and sometimes, difficult, days of her life. She lives the “Wow!” moments many times over. We were challenged as part of a Bible study lesson to find the “spiritual markers” of our lives – the evidences of God’s fingerprints, fingerprints accenting the good, the bad, the successes, the failures, the delights, and the heartaches – fingerprints that brought together the picture God was painting with my life, the story He was writing, the direction He was taking me, the lives He was changing as He changed my life first. The spiritual markers created a timeline and the “Wow!” moment within me stirred a deep gratitude for the love and grace of the sovereign God who was and is my Father.
Hosea was a prophet whom God gave a prostitute to marry. It was an object lesson for His wayward people. They had forgotten the giver of gifts, the provider of their sustenance, their deliverer, the conqueror of their enemies, the answer to life’s questions, truth and direction for hearts that chose to believe Him. And if they did take the time to look around and realize there was much they could say “thank you” for, they gave the credit to gods made by human hands, gods of nothingness, incapable, and unresponsive. They had lost the “Wow!” and when they did, they forgot the One who deserved the gratitude and their lives immersed themselves in lies and distortion. The reader of Hosea’s story finds the “Wow!” of a love that still loves, still wants to embrace, and still wants to give. Hosea’s wife prostitutes herself even after her marriage, possibly falling into both debt and slavery, for it is at the slave market, Hosea buys her back, redeems her, and the two once again begin to live out the relationship that is theirs. Hosea and his wife, especially Hosea’s response to his wife, parallel God’s love for His people, a wayward people who forgot Him and gave recognition instead to other gods, a people He never stopped loving, and in His love, still sought to redeem them, to live out with them a love that is obstinate, consuming, passionate, and unending.
Do we ever go there? Do we sometimes forget? Do we give credit to ourselves or to others for things God has done or given? Do we sometimes lose the “Wow!”? Ann Voskamp journaled – short entries, but still she wrote the “Wow!” moments – and she remembered. I have a friend who rehearses the “Wow!” as she puts her head on the pillow each night and she closes her day with gratitude to God. I am only sometimes a hand-raiser during songs of worship – and that is something I would like to change – but I sense the fervor, the intensity of some in their “Wow!” moments of worship as their bodies shout the praise that is in their hearts. It matters little how we remember. The important thing is simply to do it and to experience the “Wow!” To tell God thank you from a heart that is bursting. To let the “Wow!” soften to a quietness that assures. My God is real. My God is able. My God is ever present – in me, around me. My God is my Father.
(Related Bible reading: Hosea 3:1-5)
