Just Great

This is the message given Sunday, September 1, 2013.  The Bible verses used are Genesis 1:1-23; Romans 3:21-26; John 14:1-4.

Well, this is the conclusion of our Hymn Hysteria sermon series.  I've really enjoyed this series, and I hope you have, too.  It's been really interesting to me to find out more about these songs and the people who wrote them.  It's also been really interesting to me to really think about these songs, all of which I've been singing since I was a little kid, and to think about what the words mean and what we're actually saying when we sing them.

We're closing this series with our champion hymn, “How Great Thou Art”.  It took on some heavyweight hymns and it beat them all.  It defeated “Faith of Our Fathers”, “Nearer, My God, to Thee”, “God Will Take Care of You”, “Oh, How I Love Jesus”, “What a Friend We Have in Jesus”, and finally defeated “Amazing Grace” in the finals.

Our hymnal attributes the words and music of “How Great Thou Art” to Stuart K. Hine, but that's only partly true.  The words are based on a poem written in Sweden by Carl Boberg in 1885 and the tune is an old Swedish folk tune.  He wrote it in Swedish, of course, but it was eventually translated into a lot of other languages.  The first English translation was by E. Gustav Johnson in 1925.

The version we use now does owe much to Hine, though.  Stuart K. Hine was a British missionary.  He was born in 1899 and lived until March 14th of 1989.  He was working in the Ukraine when he heard a Russian translation of the song.  He loved it and started re-writing it and adding verses to fit the events where he was.  Hine adapted the first two verses of the song from Boberg's poem and wrote the third and fourth verses himself.  There are a variety of other versions and other verses, but the version in our hymnal is the commonly used version of “How Great Thou Art”.

As I was thinking of this song, it became clear to me why this song won our contest.  It also became clear to me why we don't sing the other verses or the other versions.  The version of the song we sing, with the verses that it has, tells us pretty much everything we need to know about God and about our faith.

The first two verses describe God's creation.  That's why we read the passage from Genesis today.  It's the story of creation.

The first verse describes the awesome power of God.  This is a God who can and did create worlds.  God created the stars and the planets and everything else.  When we see those stars and planets, when we hear the rolling thunder, we can hardly help but recognize the awesome power of God.

God is so powerful that God created all that just by speaking a word.  God said, “let it be” and it was.  Think about that.  God did not have to work hard to create the universe.  God did not have to strain to do it.  All God had to do was speak.  That's power, to be able to create the universe and do it with ease.  If God has that much power just by speaking, what do you suppose God could do if God actually used all the power God has?  It's kind of scary to think about.

But it does not have to be scary, because the second verse describes how God uses that awesome power.  God uses it to create beauty.  The beauty of the woods and the forests.  The birds that sing sweetly in the trees.  The lofty mountains.  The brooks.  The breezes.  All those things are beautiful, and all of them are created by God.

I think we're blessed around here, because we have a lot better chance than most people to see that beauty.  We actually see the stars.  We actually can hear birds singing.  We have an abundance of wildlife.  And this time of year, we have the sunflowers.  Those beautiful gold blossoms shining against the green of the plant.  Those greens and golds are so beautiful that for a minute I even forget that those are the colors of the Green Bay Packers.  It's such a beautiful sight.

We have these things around us so much that sometimes we take them for granted.  That's understandable, and in fact it's a very human thing to do.  It's too bad, though.  We should never take beauty for granted.  And we should especially never take God's beauty for granted.

You know, God would not have had to create a beautiful world.  The way the world is is not the only way God would've had to create it.  God is God.  God could've created the world any way God wanted to.  God could've created a dull, colorless world.  God could've created a very flat, featureless world.  God could've created only a few types of animals and plants, instead of the incredible variety we have.  God chose to create a beautiful, colorful world of infinite variety.  We should appreciate that.

The third verse talks about our salvation.  That's why we read the passage from the Apostle Paul's letter to the Romans.  This God, who is all-powerful and created this incredible, beautiful world, sent the Son to die.  He bore our burdens on the cross.  He bled and died.  And he did it to take away our sins.

God did not have to do that, either.  God chose to do it.  God did not have to do anything to take away our sins.  Our sins are not God's fault, they're our fault.  God does not force us to sin.  God was under no obligation to give us a chance for forgiveness and salvation.  But God does it, just because God loves us.

And the fourth verse talks about Christ coming again, to take us home.  That's why we read the passage from the gospel of John.  Jesus promises to come back and take us to the place he has prepared for us if we accept him as our Savior.  In other words, he will take us to heaven if we'll only agree to go.

Each one of those verses leads perfectly to the chorus.  When we think of how powerful God is, when we think of how God uses that power to create beauty, when we think of how God loves us so much that God sent the Son to die to take away our sins, when we think of how Jesus will come back and take us to heaven if we'll only agree to go, we're overwhelmed.  At least we should be.  That's a power and a love that's beyond my comprehension.  I can describe it, but I cannot really understand it.

All I can do, all any of us can do, is what the song says.  We can bow in humble adoration, and proclaim “my God, how great Thou art!”  All we can do is sing praises to God for how great, how awesome, how incredible God is.

This song really has almost everything we need to know about God.  There are other things we'd like to know, other things it'd be interesting to know.  We're all curious about details and facts.  We all have stuff we'd like to ask God if we have the chance.  But this is pretty much everything we need to know.  God is great, God is all-powerful, God is the creator, God creates beauty, God sent the son to die for our sins, the Son will come again to take us home, and God is worthy of praise for that.  If we were trying to explain Christianity to someone who knew nothing about it, we could do a lot worse than to show them the words to this song.

We could do a lot worse than to show ourselves the words to this song, too.  Some of you probably have them memorized.  But think about them.  Think about them every day.  Carry them with you.  Because the world has a way of wearing us down.  The world has a way of distracting us.  The world has a way of taking our minds off of how great God is and encouraging us to think of all our problems and worries instead.

         When that starts to happen, pull out the words to this song again.  Sing this song to yourself, or just read the words.  Think about them.  Remember that God truly is great, so great that God offers us the chance to go to live with God in heaven.  If we really think about that, there will not be much we can do except bow in humble adoration and proclaim, “My God, how great Thou art!”