AN: Hi there, readers! For those of you on this site who stumbled onto this random musing (not actually a story), I'd just like you to know that God loves you, no matter what you think or don't think of Him.
I'd also encourage you to have a read. You may not agree, and that's okay, but this is named Just Another Perspective, after all, so it couldn't possibly hurt ya.
Finally, everyone's entitled to an opinion and a belief, but I'd like to ask that you be mindful of your language if you so choose to review here. I don't agree with using foul language to berate and ridicule other people for their world views and critical beliefs.
Just Another Perspective
In my life as a Christian I have found it incredibly easy on many occasions to take my salvation for granted, to rationalise the way I respond (or don't respond) to God. It's easy to do – I think, like many people, I want to feel like I'm the centre of the universe – because when I feel like the universe revolves around me, I'm okay and I cope with whatever stupidity is going on around me.
I've come to realise that this attitude is wrong. I don't believe it's a healthy practice for Christians to ignore God every day up until Sunday. It can be good to feel insignificant; it's good to understand how things are from another perspective.
Brace yourselves.
The Bible says that God's ways are not my ways and His thoughts are higher than my thoughts, but sometimes it's quite difficult to fully grasp the meaning of this statement. Sometimes, I think the translations and our own interpretations of the Bible are understated in such a way that I feel like I can put God neatly into a box.
But if I could put God in a neat little box, then he wouldn't be God. Obviously.
Welcome to my personal revelation on discovering the God I believe in.
The Bible says God breathed out the stars, and that the universe (our scientists best estimate of the distance is 13.7 billion light years, going from here to the furthest star in the furthest galaxy... or something. It's big.) fits into the span of his hand.
God's presence is bigger than something with a measure we can't physically cross! His magnitude can only be described as "God-proportions."
And on the note of proportions, according to the Bible God's character is extreme and complete. There is no match for his love, because God is love. His justice is like no other, too. He is altogether perfect and whole. Nothing in his character contradicts any other part of His character, they merely complement each other - something I'll not go into here.
God is beautiful and creative – all we need to witness is in the beauty nature presents, like the sunrise on a beach, or in the foggy hills and valleys of an early morning. He made all things with such attention to detail, and such incredible beauty that it can only be there to glorify him. Watch and listen to an approaching thunderstorm and you'll see it's just as beautiful as it is devastating.
He is all seeing, all knowing, all powerful, and he is always present because he is outside the limitations of time.
Why does he get to be all those things? Because he's God.
Do you know how God refers to himself? He calls himself, "I AM." The oldest person who ever lived on this earth (or in our current history records) cannot hold a candle to God. What is a hundred, or even a thousand years to everlasting? We are all but a tiny droplet to God's unending ocean in our significance compared to Him.
How can any of us deserve respect, or even acknowledgement from Someone as vast and complete and glorious as this God?
My husband told me a funny story once about when he was a teenager.
He liked this girl, and so the girl had him talk to her parents, who were really savvy bible professors (or something along those lines). Daz had this 'super ego' then, and so he said, "Ask me anything. I guarantee I'll know the answer."
And so the girl's mother asked him, "What's the beginning of wisdom?"
Completely serious, my husband answered, "W."
If you're a savvy Christian and read your bible, you'll know she was expecting him to say something a little different. In Proverbs it says, "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom."
And people did fear the Lord. Read the Bible and you'll find out nearly everyone who had an encounter with God fell on their face, paralysed with fear.
When did we stop fearing the Lord, or acknowledging exactly how terrifying He truly is? He released his wrath in the Old Testament not only on the enemies of the Hebrews, but even on the race he deemed to call his chosen people – because they rebelled against Him time after time when he'd shown them favour.
There's an old animated movie called The Prince of Egypt, and in it my favourite part has to be when God released through Moses his Ten Plagues upon Egypt – because even the Hebrews, God's chosen people, are hiding in fear (though they are in no immediate danger) – there's a sense of reality in their response to God's wrath.
In the New Testament also, there's an account of God striking a Christian couple dead for lying to his Holy Spirit. You'd think that when dealing with God, people would realise at some point it's unwise to mess with him or take him for granted.
Plenty of times I used to imagine that if I had a time machine, I'd love to go back in history and meet Jesus. But one night in my over-tired, uncensored thoughts, I realised that it was probably the worst idea ever. If it were even possible for a human to do (it isn't), I know that he would look at me with God's eyes. Imagine for a moment what that could be like. Just think – God is physically looking directly at you, and he knows you more intimately than even you do, and there's nothing that you can hide from those eyes. Then you realise that God's the manager of time, not you, so in a way you've tried to play god. It would not be a great moment.
More like epic fail.
In many aspects, I feel so far I've only proved my unworthiness to God as someone he should invest in. When I think on all the stuff ups, the arrogant moments and every time I failed to honour Him, I feel ashamed of my life – and on behalf of humanity, because we're all the same. I wonder what God sees in us.
But the truth is, however disgusting and low we've made ourselves in our rebellion to God since the beginning of time, we were made in His image.
So when we accept what His Son Jesus Christ did to reconcile us to Him once more, God accepts us and loves us as the children of God we were created to be. Hard to really get, isn't it?
When I think of how terrifying God is in his wrath and exacting in his justice, it only makes me more glad and relieved to be in his good grace. "Our God is an awesome God" just doesn't seem to cover it.
God will blow your mind if you recognise exactly who He is. But that's not just it with God.
The Lord doesn't twiddle His (giant) thumbs saying, "Ho hum, I wish my kids would realise I exist..."
No. Just no.
He pursues us, like a protective father runs after a toddler that's wandering into danger. He cherishes us like a gentleman cherishes the woman he's in love with. And He believes in our potential because He knows where we come from.
Our God is always worthy of my worship, and compared to Him, nothing else can stand.
That's it for now, folks.
Hope it stretched your mind muscles. It did a number on mine.