yottapixels and beyond

This is a tree just outside of Niagara-on-the-Lake in Ontario. I took this picture last November at way too low a resolution by mistake, but I think it gives the tree a cool jagged effect. At least that's what I tell myself.

Here is a story from my past that I have been thinking about lately: I was visiting a church one night with friends and the worship was wonderful and the Spirit was strong and most everyone there sensed God's presence in a tangible way. The worship leader stopped playing and we all just stood in silence for a bit, revelling in the sweetness of it. Then he said, "I think God is saying, 'It doesn't get any better than this.'" Before I could stop myself or even think about what I was doing, I found myself jumping up and down in the front row and yelling, "Yes, it does! It gets WAY better than this!" The worship leader graciously accepted my words and embraced them (love ya, Dan) and no harm was done other than Dean getting embarrassed (sorry, Dean). He has since come to mostly enjoy my unpredictable ways.

This phrase has become a sort of motto for my life since then. There has to be more to God than I have experienced, there must be more depth and breadth to his love than I know, he must be wiser and kinder and more powerful than I can imagine and more willing to make himself known than I ever give him credit for. When I think of him, I am quite certain that I underestimate his good intentions and his faithfulness. Sort of like my low resolution photo up there, my picture of him falls apart and pixelates into fuzziness all too quickly because I cannot hold the entire image of God in my mind or heart. His details are too minute for me to grasp and his largeness way beyond my peripheral vision. God is bigger and smaller than I can know or experience. You can zoom in or zoom out all you want with the most powerful instruments we have and never see his entire scope. The sweetest moment I have ever experienced will never be as good as it gets because God is always capable of more. The question is never how vast or powerful God is, but how much of Him am I willing to open my arms to and embrace. Will I let myself be overwhelmed?

A yotta pixel is 10 to the eighteenth power times larger than a megapixel.

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Names of God

The Hebrew word "YHWH" (read from right to left) This past Sunday I gave a talk on the Names of God, the beginning of a series on this topic. This first talk was to be a gentle introduction so I thought it wouldn't take too many hours of preparation. Well, I quickly discovered that the research is almost bottomless; every time I thought I had a somewhat definitive list of names, I found another source which added a few more or gave a different twist on some of the names I had already come across. After several hours I was getting overwhelmed by the sheer amount of data (and that was only looking at the Hebrew Bible). I wondered how I could present this to people in an orderly and accessible fashion and within a reasonable time frame. Not everyone is up for a 3-hour lecture crammed full of detail on a Sunday morning. So I took a break and spent a bit of time meditating on this problem and asking the Spirit for guidance. And then I thought that being overwhelmed by Go...

soul refrigerator

I went grocery shopping yesterday and came home with three bags of food. After I unpacked them all, this is what my fridge looked like: really empty. How does that happen? How can I feel so full and ready for any food emergency one moment, and after one quick glance, realise that I have nothing, really? Today is one of those days in my soul as well. I woke up with gratitude and fullness in my heart, ready to take on this day and all the wonderful opportunities that it presented. Then I caught a brief glance of some emptiness in my life and bam - my buoyancy was compromised. For the past few hours I have been treading water, trying to keep my head in a positive space, bobbing in and out of disappointment, and catching myself whining with pathetic indignity at the cement blocks of other people's stupidity that are tangled around my ankles. When I am staring at the empty refrigerator of my soul, these are my thoughts. Where do I go from here? Perhaps I should slam that refrigerator ...

3 blog time stealers

Things have a been a bit slow in my blog-world lately because my usual schedule has been disrupted by wonderful but time-consuming events. ONE: I opened my first exhibit of photos this week. It is kind of a strange sensation to see ones art displayed in a public setting and have people study it up close and offer their comments. I have been pleasantly surprised by the reaction of all and am always amazed by the wonderful support of the folks in our church group and my friends from all walks of life. One of them even compared the dilapidated old stone church basement with fluorescent lighting where the exhibit is being held to the humble beginnings of some famous artist whose name I can't remember right now. I like the concept of humble beginnings because it is something Jesus loves as well. And beauty shows well in humble beginnings. TWO: I have been helping a far-off friend search for an apartment in Montreal. She emails me the details of a place she is interested in and I go sc...

outWORD by Matte Downey

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