I don't really have anything to say today. My thoughts are scattered, half-finished, unimpressive...and I have a cold. Thus, I'm not a very great candidate for writing something meaningful in my blog today. I want to hold off and write nothing until I feel better and something has cemented in my brain: that is to say, until I have something with which to impress you the reader, myself, and God with.
But God doesn't need to be impressed by me. To start with, He probably isn't impressed, no matter what I do. I mean, He's the God of the universe and I'm just a lump of tissues He made from dust on one corner of one very small rocky planet orbiting a stable but otherwise unremarkable yellow star lost somewhere in the spinning arms of a generic spiral galaxy--one among a few hundred billion of which He spoke into existence on a single day. What's there to be impressed with, exactly? Anything I do, He's outdone infinitely. It's not even like I can impress Him even with my performance given my circumstances (of not being God of the whole universe), since about 2,000 years ago He came down and took on flesh and lived a life very much like my own: except that He did much better despite living in less advantageous circumstances. So I am, in this sense, nothing for God to get excited about, even on my very best days (and this is not one of them).
And yet, He is excited about me. Everything He says and does demonstrates that He's quite taken with me and wants me to be totally enamored with Him. On a slow day, with assignments piling up like tissues in my trashcan (and boy are those piling up!) and my thoughts scattered uselessly in a dozen different directions, that thought stops me, makes me sit back and just say, "Wow."
How can that be? God is seriously the most majestic, powerful, and wonderful being in existence. He's so much bigger and better than anything or anyone we vainly imagine to love us. He's so much better than we deserve, ever. Yet God condescends to love us, to love me. Me! With my nose turning slightly red and my eyes watering and my unshaved chin itching, and my thoughts on--of all things--a smartphone commercial featuring two fighting robots. How stupid and small and fickle I am! And yet, God loves me. I do not say that He loves how much of an idiot I am, fixating on these things and thinking of them rather than Him. He loves me though, rather like a boy loves a girl who is distracted from him, staring at her from across the room as she makes crude doodles in her notebook and scratches at her zits. Her flaws are not apparent to the boy, because he is in love with her. God is not blinded by infatuation, but the death of His Son has purged my sin in His eyes. He no longer sees my zits and crude sketches as glaring and repellent flaws, for by the work of His Son, applied through the Spirit, He intends to (as I run away with the analogy--not literally) give me beautiful complexion in the end, and through my hand draw masterpieces. When I realize this, I am in awe of Him.
I could see it, perhaps, if God decided to become involved with me personally when I had it all (or nearly all) figured out. His love would be comprehensible if it only extended to me when I felt myself worthy of it (and actually was). But without His intervention, that will never be, and so His love extends to me even now, just as I am (though this is not the way He means me to be). Even this would not be such a stretch if His love only covered the big picture. If God was indifferent to my day-to-day routine, calloused to my minor ailments and annoyances, and shrugged off my temporary swings of mood, I could understand it. He's here for the bigger picture. He wants something from me, that's why He's here. Once He get's it, He'll be gone. That's the way I've looked at God a lot, I confess, and as a consequence I feel like I've lived half my life (and still often find myself) looking over one shoulder, trying to see if He's still there. I've been waiting for the other shoe to drop, for Him to announce that the purpose of my life just got fulfilled and He's done with me now--or far, far, far more likely, storm away from me shaking His head in disgust, deciding that His big plans are better accomplished through somebody not quite as flawed, not half as bad a failure as I am. Sometimes, I even directly ask Him to do that in my prayers. Sometimes, I'm so weighed down in sin and guilt I just cry out, "God, why are you still here?! When will you take a hint? I'm a loser, you belong with someone else. I don't want you to leave, but you really should. I'll never be the sort of person you want me to be. I'll only disappoint you, so you might as well cut your losses and get out of my life now!"
He never listens, by the way. Never. Sometimes it frustrates me and makes me want to tear my hair out! How can He be so persistent!?! But He is, and the truth of the matter is, He isn't sticking around for anything I might give Him (it's not like He needs anything, anyway, is it?). The other shoe will never drop because, quite simply, there is no other shoe to drop. God is interested in me not for something I may or may not fail to achieve, but for me myself. He's after my heart, right now, right here, even as I type these words (by the way, Who do you think prompted me to type a blog entry when I was feeling like crud off the bottom of a fish pond--and really wanted to post, but didn't think I had anything to say? If your answer starts with a Go and ends with a d and has three letters, then you're correct.) He loves my heart. He courts it, me, in every thing. Even the minutia of a day when I feel crummy and unremarkable. Jesus loves me, and that is sooo remarkable!
I wish I knew Him better. I wish I was more like Him. I wish my life didn't always seem to be an endless chase scene with Him so purposefully and masterfully pursing me, and me so stupidly and awkwardly running away. At least there are some good times when He corners me (like now). I wish that happened more often. I wish I didn't always wind up on the run again. Being captured in His embrace is just so much better! I suppose it will be like that forever someday. That's what I imagine Heaven is like. No more running, not even a desire to run or hide my heart! Just me and Him, together forever (I know that there will be other believers up there--a lot of them!--but in that day, we will all be one and He will be the Bridegroom and we will be the Bride at the marriage supper of the Lamb).
Someday, someday...and in the meantime, He is still with me!
But God doesn't need to be impressed by me. To start with, He probably isn't impressed, no matter what I do. I mean, He's the God of the universe and I'm just a lump of tissues He made from dust on one corner of one very small rocky planet orbiting a stable but otherwise unremarkable yellow star lost somewhere in the spinning arms of a generic spiral galaxy--one among a few hundred billion of which He spoke into existence on a single day. What's there to be impressed with, exactly? Anything I do, He's outdone infinitely. It's not even like I can impress Him even with my performance given my circumstances (of not being God of the whole universe), since about 2,000 years ago He came down and took on flesh and lived a life very much like my own: except that He did much better despite living in less advantageous circumstances. So I am, in this sense, nothing for God to get excited about, even on my very best days (and this is not one of them).
And yet, He is excited about me. Everything He says and does demonstrates that He's quite taken with me and wants me to be totally enamored with Him. On a slow day, with assignments piling up like tissues in my trashcan (and boy are those piling up!) and my thoughts scattered uselessly in a dozen different directions, that thought stops me, makes me sit back and just say, "Wow."
How can that be? God is seriously the most majestic, powerful, and wonderful being in existence. He's so much bigger and better than anything or anyone we vainly imagine to love us. He's so much better than we deserve, ever. Yet God condescends to love us, to love me. Me! With my nose turning slightly red and my eyes watering and my unshaved chin itching, and my thoughts on--of all things--a smartphone commercial featuring two fighting robots. How stupid and small and fickle I am! And yet, God loves me. I do not say that He loves how much of an idiot I am, fixating on these things and thinking of them rather than Him. He loves me though, rather like a boy loves a girl who is distracted from him, staring at her from across the room as she makes crude doodles in her notebook and scratches at her zits. Her flaws are not apparent to the boy, because he is in love with her. God is not blinded by infatuation, but the death of His Son has purged my sin in His eyes. He no longer sees my zits and crude sketches as glaring and repellent flaws, for by the work of His Son, applied through the Spirit, He intends to (as I run away with the analogy--not literally) give me beautiful complexion in the end, and through my hand draw masterpieces. When I realize this, I am in awe of Him.
I could see it, perhaps, if God decided to become involved with me personally when I had it all (or nearly all) figured out. His love would be comprehensible if it only extended to me when I felt myself worthy of it (and actually was). But without His intervention, that will never be, and so His love extends to me even now, just as I am (though this is not the way He means me to be). Even this would not be such a stretch if His love only covered the big picture. If God was indifferent to my day-to-day routine, calloused to my minor ailments and annoyances, and shrugged off my temporary swings of mood, I could understand it. He's here for the bigger picture. He wants something from me, that's why He's here. Once He get's it, He'll be gone. That's the way I've looked at God a lot, I confess, and as a consequence I feel like I've lived half my life (and still often find myself) looking over one shoulder, trying to see if He's still there. I've been waiting for the other shoe to drop, for Him to announce that the purpose of my life just got fulfilled and He's done with me now--or far, far, far more likely, storm away from me shaking His head in disgust, deciding that His big plans are better accomplished through somebody not quite as flawed, not half as bad a failure as I am. Sometimes, I even directly ask Him to do that in my prayers. Sometimes, I'm so weighed down in sin and guilt I just cry out, "God, why are you still here?! When will you take a hint? I'm a loser, you belong with someone else. I don't want you to leave, but you really should. I'll never be the sort of person you want me to be. I'll only disappoint you, so you might as well cut your losses and get out of my life now!"
He never listens, by the way. Never. Sometimes it frustrates me and makes me want to tear my hair out! How can He be so persistent!?! But He is, and the truth of the matter is, He isn't sticking around for anything I might give Him (it's not like He needs anything, anyway, is it?). The other shoe will never drop because, quite simply, there is no other shoe to drop. God is interested in me not for something I may or may not fail to achieve, but for me myself. He's after my heart, right now, right here, even as I type these words (by the way, Who do you think prompted me to type a blog entry when I was feeling like crud off the bottom of a fish pond--and really wanted to post, but didn't think I had anything to say? If your answer starts with a Go and ends with a d and has three letters, then you're correct.) He loves my heart. He courts it, me, in every thing. Even the minutia of a day when I feel crummy and unremarkable. Jesus loves me, and that is sooo remarkable!
I wish I knew Him better. I wish I was more like Him. I wish my life didn't always seem to be an endless chase scene with Him so purposefully and masterfully pursing me, and me so stupidly and awkwardly running away. At least there are some good times when He corners me (like now). I wish that happened more often. I wish I didn't always wind up on the run again. Being captured in His embrace is just so much better! I suppose it will be like that forever someday. That's what I imagine Heaven is like. No more running, not even a desire to run or hide my heart! Just me and Him, together forever (I know that there will be other believers up there--a lot of them!--but in that day, we will all be one and He will be the Bridegroom and we will be the Bride at the marriage supper of the Lamb).
Someday, someday...and in the meantime, He is still with me!
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