God wants you to create and color outside the lines. Faithfulness is measured as much by innovation as obedience. God’s vision is full of surprises and God wants you to be surprising too.

Some people believe that we live in a zero-sum world. There is a very limited amount of creativity and adventure to go around, and our primary competitor is God. God is sovereign and any creativity on our part takes away from God’s power and authority, exalting the creature over the creator. In fact, to some people, God has already decided in advance what we will do and how the world’s history will unfold. Nothing happens apart from God’s plan; and nothing new can be added to God’s eternal plan – even by God!

I take a very different path – the path of adventure for God and us. I believe that we live in an open-source universe. The future is open and waiting to emerge – for God and for us! God wants us to be creative and do new things. Like a loving parent, rejoicing in her child’s “refrigerator art,” God delights in your life-supporting creativity. In fact, the more we do, the more God can do in response. Our freedom and creativity inspires new and more intense expressions of divine freedom and creativity.

Every moment God presents us with numerous possibilities and pathways to follow. But, God leaves the outcome to our initiative and creativity. The world is a dynamic call and response, in which God calls and we respond, leading to further possibilities for call and response.

Mother Teresa saw her calling as doing “something beautiful for God” and that is our calling,
too – to bring beauty into the world and to God’s experience. Our lives are our gifts to God, so today, God wants you to do something beautiful and to enjoy the beauties of the earth.

Throughout the day, I invite you to live by your affirmations:
God delights in my creativity.
I bring beauty to every relationship and situation.
I am God’s partner in bringing beauty to the world.
I bring beauty to (a particular person or situation).

As you go from place to place, pause in each encounter to see the deeper beauties of life. Make a commitment to bring beauty to every encounter, prayerfully asking for God’s guidance and insight in every situation.

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