Is God a Scrooge?

     Honestly, sometimes I’ve pictured God as a prune-faced miser. But a speaker I heard pointed out how crazy that is. After all, the first thing the Almighty told people after creating them was to have sex - that’s what it takes to “be fruitful and multiply.” The Master Designer could have shaped us into single-cell organisms that simply divide to reproduce. Instead, he fashioned a sizzling modus operandi.
     The next thing the Deity told people was to take charge. In other words, don’t be slackers. Go for great things. Turn grain into objects as diverse as bread and beer. Alloy tin and copper into bronze. Blow through a stick and you have a woodwind. He invites us to be creative, just as he is.
     Then he told people to feast. He prepared a setting as gorgeous as the pages in Fine Gardening and declared, “bon appetite.”
     And the Divine blessed people. That’s like saying, “I’m smiling as you set out on this grand adventure of life.”
     Wow. This blows a hole into any “stern Man Upstairs” ideas that creep into my thinking. I don’t think this means I rush into a dark-chocolate-truffle orgy. But it reveals facets of God I easily forget. That he’s sensual - he created the senses, after all. He’s indulgent - providing crazy-good things like fresh basil, purring kittens, spectacular sunrises, hugging arms, and barbecue. And he wants me to flourish in this lavish world he created.
​     Radical!