"Do you love God?"

When was the last time you were asked a seemingly simple question like this? And no, I'm not talking about the sort of question accompanied by a sort of damning tone that mothers are best at. You know, the ones where you just did something 'naughty' and she lays on the guilt trip? Of course, you reluctantly have to answer the only way you can without getting into more trouble, and then comes the punch, "Well God doesn't like it when you do that..." This is not what I am talking about.

For me, it came last night during the usual end-of-the-day reminiscing when my wife suddenly yet casually asked me, "Do you love God?" I was taken aback. I didn't know why, but the question unnerved me.

God. Creator of the Universe. Definer of Good. Author of Beauty.

I love music, I love pepperoni and ham pizza, I love my family, my church, my wife...but this? It was like asking an ant what he thought of the Eiffel Tower. How could I begin to even understand God, much less love Him in the same intimate way as I love my wife? Or the way a great blues guitarist captures my soul and I can feel the emotion with every bending note?

My wife was still waiting for my reply. "I don't know...I try," came my latent and somewhat awestruck answer.

It is hard to understand how we could be in an intimate, loving relationship with Someone so complex in the same simple way that we love music. He created it! Every note, every progression, every genre- none would exist had He not built the foundations for its discovery.

Maybe for you it's computers. You love tinkering with them and finding out the way that they work because, for whatever reason, that relates to your personality. But how do you relate to the one who laid the framework for the binary code?

Or perhaps you go to a singles group because you can find people there who are going through the same things as you. But how do you relate to God? How do you define a intimate loving relationship with Him?

How do we relate to a perfect and infinite God, when we are imperfect finite beings?

We only know the simple things that our heart can get a hold of- if we try to wrap our minds around a way to love God that is not of ourselves, we can't do it.

Yet He not only loves us, but He commands us to love Him.

Could it be that the One, the True God calls us to simply love Him? To simply worship Him? To simply say, "Here is my heart, my mind, and my soul- I don't know what good it will do You, but here it is." And could God take our simple offering and enter into a personal relationship with us?

I believe that He can and He does, everyday.

And when we offer up this simple plea to the God of the Universe, something begins to happen- if we watch for it.

I love the song 'Stars' by the David Crowder Band. If I was really honest, I would say I tear up most times I hear it. The song depicts the glory of God on display in the rising and setting of the sun and in the moon and the stars at night. And the song goes on:

And how could such a thing shine its light on me

and make everything beautiful again?

You should hear the angels sing,

all gathered 'round their king,

more beautiful than you could dream,

I've been quietly listening,

You can hear them now,

I can hear them now.

And how could such a King shine His light on me,

and make everything beautiful again?

And in this moment I can feel the song take hold of my soul. I can picture the glory of God and the angels shouting praise unto Him! And yet, He looks down at me and takes the time to dust off the things that keep from being all that He made me to be. And as the song climax's and I can hear the emotion in Crowders voice, it becomes the emotion that is in mine.

And the thing that is interesting, is that it is not in David Crowders words or great songwriting skills- I know it's not, because not everybody feels this same way when they hear the song. Rather it is God peeling the scales off of my eyes to see that in everything beautiful, He is singing a love song to me.

This must be why God created music in the first place. Why He created the binary code. Why He created the moon and the stars. And why He created the longing for love and community within our hearts. It is so that I can see His glory in the simple things. In the things that delight my soul. And know that in those moments He is singing me a love song. A song I know well. A song I can relate to.

God. Creator of the Universe. Definer of Good. Author of Beauty.

...He sung to me today in the simple form of a question.