LIFE TIP:
"When you turn on a light in a dark room and suddenly see the furniture for the first time, it does not mean that the furniture did not exist before the light was turned on. Indeed, the now illuminated room explains the objects you were bumping into in the dark." – (B.B. Warfield)
Have you ever wondered why so many outdoorsmen who have a relationship with God claim that the outdoors is where they meet with God? I constantly hear them say "I feel closer to God when I am in the woods?" God is Omnipresent meaning He is everywhere. You don't need to be in the woods, or even in church for that matter to meet with Him. So why do we always hear these kind of statements? We find the answer in scripture.
Psalm 33:6-9
6 By the word of the Lord the heavens were made,
their starry host by the breath of his mouth.
7 He gathers the waters of the sea into jars;
he puts the deep into storehouses.
8 Let all the earth fear the Lord;
let all the people of the world revere him.
9 For he spoke, and it came to be;
he commanded, and it stood firm.
Psalm 19:1
1 The heavens declare the glory of God;
the skies proclaim the work of his hands.
My wife and I took a cruise for our 10th anniversary the other year and one of the this we decided to do was visit the on ship art auction. I am not the artsy-fartsy kind of guy but I thought it might be something interesting to watch. I was first amazed at the amount some of these paintings were selling for. I remember one painting selling for more than $40,000! We could barely afford the cruise let alone buying art for that price while on it! As they presented painting after painting and described the artist and their work I began to recognized certain paintings before the auctioneer even told us who painted it. I could see certain characteristics and colors in the painting that helped me quickly identify the creator.
This is why people feel so close to God in the outdoors. Your in His "painting". God chose to use His creation to reveal Himself to us. It's called general revelation. Just as looking at a painting, a watch, or a piece of machinery clearly reveals that there was someone who created it, the outdoors reveals the same…a creator.
I read B.B. Warfield's statement the other day and it jumped off the page at me. This is exactly what I see happening in the lives of outdoorsmen when I have the privilege of presenting the Gospel to them at a game dinner. You can almost literally see the light come on and their eyes being opened to what they had been bumping into all along in their adventures in the outdoors.
Romans 1:20
20 For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse.
While I know God is with me always, there is a sense of being closer to Him while I walk around inside His painting.
FIELD TIP: Hunting in different areas of the country can product many different scenarios. Food and water sources can be greatly different from place to place. For instance, you may have a mountain stream providing water for whitetails in Pennsylvania, but only have a farmers water trough as a source in the plains out west. Scouting out where the necessary sources of survival for the game you are after with help increase your odds of success during your hunt.
