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I wonder if we have used the expression “Awesome!” to such an extent that the true meaning of “awe” has been lost on us. I decided to look up the word “awe” on dictionary .com yesterday:

  • overwhelming feeling of reverence, admiration

I knew that. Nothing new there. But something was compelling me to dig a little deeper. There was more waiting to be found. I remembered times of feeling reverence and/or admiration for God, for His creation. I thought of the time while on vacation, Dan & I stood watching the sun set from our balcony in St. Maarten. There was a light drizzle & the hues of color in the sky were just splendid. A rainbow appeared in the sky. We admired the colors displayed. We were struck by the size of the arc. Then another appeared & we were laughing & saying, “What were the odds?”. And then it happened – AWE – as a third appeared. We stood there, overwhelmed & in silence.

Reminiscing about the rainbows, made me realize that the operative word in the definition of awe was truly not reverence or admiration, although both are certainly true. It was the word “overwhelming”. So back to dictionary.com:

overwhelming —> overpowering, so great as to render resistance useless.

That is what awe does to us. It so overpowers us that we cannot resist. We are struck in such a way that we are unable to move, to even speak a word. That day in St. Maarten was such a profound moment for my husband & I as we witnessed a beauty that we both knew only our God could have created for us. We stood together, still & silent. Awestruck by our God. As I thought on all this today, this verse came to me:

Lord, I have heard of your fame; I stand in awe of your deeds, O Lord. Renew them in our day, in our time make them known; in wrath remember mercy. (Habakkuk 3:2 NIV84).

We have heard of our God’s fame. We have recorded for us, in His Word,the many miraculous things that He did. We have heard testimonies down through the years of the amazing. But I want them renewed in my lifetime. I want to be stopped in my tracks, down on my knees & in awe as my God does the impossible.

** I joined in at Wednesday Wanderings .