Trail of Grace: Creation

"Why does God create anything? Here’s a big philosophical question: Why is there something instead of nothing? Why is there existence as opposed to nothingness? Weird questions, right? But seriously, why did God create anything? Why is it that when God created, he created with an unnecessary diversity? Why is it that he created such a high level of extravagance? I mean, we did this video before with the tour of the pools, and we're rating them on a scale of 1 to 10 on functionality and 1 to 10 on beauty. There's a sense in which you can have both, you can swim in just about any pool, but not all pools are strikingly beautiful. Why is it that when God made the world, it doesn't remind us of an inflatable pool in the backyard, but it's more of an absolute extravagance? Why does God create in that kind of way? Why is it that God filled the earth with life that is endless in variety, boundless in scope, that it's relentless and resilient, that it's marvelous in complexity? Why has God gone to such great lengths? He's under no obligation. It's not anything that we would deserve. Last week we defined grace as getting something that we don't deserve. If we look at creation around us, it looks like the grace of God. It's just this large extravagance, over-the-top grace. That's exactly what God does. And when God creates, he calls it good."