who being the brightness of His glory and the express image of His person, and upholding all things by the word of His power, when He had by Himself purged our sins, sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high, having become so much better than the angels, as He has by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they. (Hebrews 01:03-04, NKJV).
Christ is clearly depicted as the agent of Creation in several places in the New Testament, and within the Book of Hebrews. But He did not just bring everything into existence and then sit back and watch events unfold. He is, instead, intimately involved in the continued workings of existence. Colossians affirms this truth.
For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created through Him and for Him. And He is before all things, and in Him all things consist. (Colossians 1:16, 17, NKJV).
This is important and flies in the face of the Deistic proposition that God, while being the Uncaused First Cause, got that first domino moving and has ever since been letting them fall where they may.
The truth is considerably at odds with this specious idea.
Christ created and maintains the Universe. And He does so simply by the word of His power, which is indicative of His unimaginable omnipotence. He spoke and galaxies leapt into existence, and it is by that same fiat that all matter is kept from being torn apart. One day, He will simply let go, and all the elements will melt in a fervent heat as matter and antimatter collide in a universal cascade of annihilation.
This means that Christ, the Logos, or Word of God, has intimate knowledge of every subatomic particle's interaction with every other subatomic particle throughout all the vastness of space/time. Note this quote from the Gospel of John:
And there are also many other things that Jesus did, which if they were written one by one, I suppose that even the world itself could not contain the books that would be written. Amen. (John 21:25, NKJV).
This is literally true (and more) if every event in the universe under His upholding control were somehow recorded.
Consider also the chemical letters designed and encoded by the Logos within DNA. It is estimated that the amount of genetic words stored in just a teaspoon of these building blocks of life would fill thousands of volumes. The amount of information is staggering. And this is just one of countless examples of His creative and maintaining power.
I do not believe it is possible to overstate both the strength and involvement of God in absolutely everything. He is as far from an impersonal Force, or an aloof Deity as it is possible to be.
And each and every one of His upholding actions is purposeful and significant. There is no unthinking automaton, or program at the core of existence; no autopilot setting. It is all Him at every instant.
But His primary concern in all this incomprehensible management is not the physical universe, but us.
Think about that and marvel that you mean so much to Him.
The most brilliant, the most involved, the most powerful, the most caring human you have ever known is not even as a single atom in comparison to the One we worship as Lord and Savior. In fact, there can be no comparison to the immensity of our God's interest and involvement in all spheres of existence, physical and non-physical.
Again, all focused on us.
If you doubt this conclusion, look to the Cross.
And we have only begun to look at all the superlatives regarding Jesus in this most amazing book of Scripture.
The journey will become ever more enriching as we proceed.
