Feeling Small
What is mankind that you are mindful of them, human beings that you care for them?
Psalm 8:4
Many movie critics consider David Lean’s Lawrence of Arabia one of the greatest films of all time. With its seemingly endless vistas of the Arabian deserts, it has influenced a generation of filmmakers—including Academy Award-winning director Steven Spielberg. “I was inspired the first time I saw Lawrence,” said Spielberg. “It made me feel puny. It still makes me feel puny. And that’s one measure of its greatness.”
What makes me feel small is creation’s vastness—when I gaze at an ocean, fly over the polar ice cap, or survey a night sky sparkling with a billion stars. If the created universe is so expansive, how much greater must be the Creator who spoke it into being!
God’s greatness and our feelings of insignificance are echoed by David when he declares, “What are mere mortals that you should think about them, human beings that you should care for them?” (Psalm 8:4 nlt). But Jesus assures us, “Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?” (Matthew 6:26).
I may feel small and insignificant, but through my Father’s eyes, I have great worth—a worth that is proven every time I look at the cross. The price He was willing to pay to restore me to fellowship with Him is evidence of how He values me.
By Bill Crowder
REFLECT & PRAY
Father, help us to remember Your heart is for us. Read The Surprising Side of God at discoveryseries.org/q0213.
What wonder of creation draws your attention to God? How does it impact you to know how much your Creator values you?
Your gift changes lives. Help us share God’s love with millions every day.
SCRIPTURE INSIGHT
Our passage today continues Christ’s Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7) and is a subsection of the major theme considered in chapter 6—“the Christian walking and living in this world, in his relationship to the Father” (D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Studies in the Sermon on the Mount). But while the earlier subsection (vv. 19-24) deals with the danger of laying up and hoarding the treasures of this earth, this portion is concerned with our worrying or being anxious about material things. Some believe the first passage addresses the rich, while today’s addresses the poor or those who struggle to make ends meet. But it’s also possible for the rich to be obsessed with worry over material things. No matter how we look at these texts, both convey the danger of trying to find our security anywhere but in God and His great care for us (1 Peter 5:7). Alyson Kieda
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