Padre's Corner - Recognizing the hidden creator

Booths were everywhere. The craftsmen are generally not natural salesmen and women, and this is obvious as you walk between the display tables. It's their work that is out front. Furniture, crafts, gadgets, tools, antiques and replicas are often what they rely on to “do the talking” for them. If you stop and show a little interest in their works of art, you can sometimes coax them into explaining what it took to arrive at what now remains.

I walked by one booth and on the table was a number of hand-crafted (not from a kit) replicas of tractor-trailers, farm machinery and cars. Having dabbled in woodworking myself I could begin to appreciate that the person who made what was before me was a patient and skilled master woodcarver. But, there was no one in the booth. Perhaps nature had called? Or, he was visiting another booth? I do not know. I guess, though, in a way, I did not need to meet him “face-to-face.” I knew enough from seeing his work to know what he was like: a person who cared a great deal about detail and took pride in his work. I knew him through what he had made; it did the talking for him even though I would never meet him face to face.

It was fall, and as my wife and I walked outside the building I saw acorns that had fallen off a tree on the ground. The ones on the sidewalk were getting squashed, but the ones in the grass that the squirrels had not carted away were still intact. Ingenious little devices those acorns are. Packed inside the shells is everything that is needed to produce another tree. And from that tree, another couple thousand more, and from them millions more trees could grow and cover much of Ontario. I marveled at how amazingly designed that one tree-seed was. The carvings inside were far inferior to this living, multiplying, device.

And then it occurred to me: the acorn was just sitting there, on display for me to marvel at, and yet there was no one around to claim the credit for the brilliance of its design, just like what I had just seen. Technically speaking it was just a bit of soil and moisture, arranged on an atomic level in such a way so as to be able to produce a forest of mighty oak trees. Yet, the soil and moisture in that acorn had no more self-intelligence than the block of wood the carver made into a model truck. If the truck had to have a maker, (any other option is irrational) then so did the acorn! This acorn, obviously, took some planning.

So, I picked up an acorn and looked around to see who made it, and no one was there to take the credit. The “booth” seemed empty. Then it dawned on me; no one had to be there. The genius of one acorn was evidence of its maker's existence and abilities. The acorn was doing the talking for someone, making a “face-to-face” meeting not necessary. I could believe in “Him,” by faith, logic, or with a little scientific study of this acorn.

I love the opening line of the Bible: “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” It is simple, profound, all encompassing, and so obviously logical. Next time you’re outside among His works, let yourself be lost in wonder when that little bird flies by, that he is just dirt and water, too.