“He is before all things, and by Him all things hold together.”
- Colossians 1:17
How can God be "before" ALL things? That doesn't even make sense to me. I think about this past year, the pandemic, when we all lost SO much, when so many of us forgot that we belong to each other and didn't love well, when we felt more divided than ever... I don't have the answers to that, but when I think about the creation story, and how the spirit was hovering over the darkness, and God spoke light and life into being, when I think about how all creation was somehow spoken through the Living Word, Jesus, this verse begins to make a tinge of sense to me. We came from a place of LOVE. God started this whole relationship thing with us, and even though we make a mess of it all down here, He's not giving up on us. He's holding us together. He knows that Love Wins in the end, and so it's mysterious, verses like this, the ones I can't quite wrap my head around, that keep me lifting my eyes to the hills, keep me hoping even when all feels hopeless, because to remember that we came from Love and that we are held by God's love, and that we can rest in Him even when all is not well here on this broken and beautiful earth, brings me an unexplainable sense of peace, and I'm SO grateful for it.
