Have you given much thought to the words that we use when we talk about God?

The truth is, that because God is limitless and our words, whatever language(s) we may speak, are limited, it is hard to properly describe God. We need to be careful that the words we use don’t limit God to exactly what we need/want him to be. We also need to make sure that the words we use do not make God beyond our reach. Instead, we need to get to know God through prayer, praise, contemplation, study, and revelation. Even then, we must choose our words carefully.

            One of the words I most associate with God is overwhelming. To ponder God takes our minds to heights that quickly become almost too much for us. We become filled with hope, with joy, with contentment. To immerse ourselves in thoughts of God allows us to escape the ordinary of this world and to garner a glimpse of the extraordinary of eternal life. God is overwhelming in that if we commit ourselves to getting to know him, he rewards us with goodness beyond the ability of worldly things.

            Amazing is another word that often comes to mind when we think of God. A look around at the order of nature and the beauty of creation causes us to be amazed at what God has done for us. Too often science tries to explain the miracle of creation with theories and proposals. There is a desire to eliminate God from the equation. But the fact is that science, ( and we should remember that even the human intellect was created by God) can tell us how things may have happened but not why they happened. Only the source of all beauty could have designed and created a rose. Only perfection could have created summer colors and only a genius would have the wisdom to follow these with the spectacular leaves of Autumn. It is amazing that times and seasons, that solar systems and planets, that sun and moon, that birds of the air and flowers of the fields continue to do what they do to remind us of the length and breadth and depth of God’s love for us.

            Awesome is another word that helps us to know who God is. For a while awesome was a word to describe anything that was good. It was almost overused. I do not hear it as much as I used to, but I am of the mind that the only person that should ever be described as awesome is God. Whatever God does is done out of love and done on a scale that is out of this world. God’s mercy is unlike any mercy we might experience on this earth. God’s justice and fairness in his relationship with his most loved creation blows our minds. God’s love for us, desiring us to be righteous in this life and to love even those who make it difficult to love them is the only force that will ever restore heaven on earth. Of course, God taking on the human condition, becoming one of us to save us and set us free is an act of love that can never be measured. God is awesome and, to my mind, there is no one or nothing that even comes close.

            We read in the Gospel according to John, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” We have come to know that this Word is none other than Jesus, God the Son. Jesus is ultimately the Word that leads us to know God. Jesus is the Word that allows us to know God’s love for us. Jesus is the Word that offers us comfort in every situation and challenges us to be all we were created to be. Jesus is the Word, that reveals to us that God is indeed overwhelming, amazing, and awesome and so much more.

            As we seek to grow our relationship with God, as we seek to unite ourselves to the One who is Love, we need to choose our words carefully. We need to choose words that remind us that we are seeking the source of all beauty, the giver of all life, and the one who fulfills all our hope. We are seeking what eye has not seen, what ear has not heard, what our minds cannot begin to conceive. Remembering this may lead us to seek Jesus first in all our thoughts and prayers, in our work and our play, in our success and in our challenge. Because seeking Jesus who is the Word of God leads us to experience more than a glimpse of heaven on earth.