What Do We Expect From God?
Sunday Psalm 7.28.24
Article voiceover
Father God Lord Jesus Holy Spirit We present ourselves before You again this Sunday. What we expect of You differs. Shaped by how we’ve been treated by Human authorities—parents and bosses, Teachers and caregivers—we’ve developed A sense of how human authority works. And we instinctively expect You, the Ultimate authority, to respond To us in a similar way. No matter what the Bible says, we assume certain Emotional expectations about how authority acts. That can be helpful or challenging. Perhaps we learned to expect a smile And a hug when our father walked through The door in the evening, along with A question about our day at school. Or from a boss who gave little praise, We learned to expect criticism from authorities. Or we might have had a high school teacher who Saw something in us and affirmed a talent. We want to walk through our days Expecting kindness, correction, and comfort. We want to expect your mercy. We want to expect your help. You are our dwelling place forever, and Underneath are the everlasting arms. We will never give up leaning on those arms. There’s always a deeper stillness. And the best rest is yet to be. Amen.
Hi Karen,
Great reflection. We absolutely DO get our idea of God from the things around us instead of letting Scripture be the primary formation. And ... it's not a good approach to life!
Tozer once wrote:
"What comes into the mind when we think of God is the most important thing about us, for we tend by a secret law of the soul to move toward our mental image of God."
When he says that our (false) ideas of God "are the most important things about us," he means we really, REALLY have to examine them. Because they those ideas drive our actions, thoughts, emotions, and judgments. We think they are real, but only what Scripture says is real.
But CS Lewis (who liked Tozer) read Tozer's comment and responded with this:
"I read in a periodical the other day that the fundamental thing is how we think of God. By God Himself, it is not! How God thinks of us is not only more important, but infinitely more important."
And what does God think of us??? We read about it in Scripture when we see Jesus on the cross.
And that ... that brings us full circle, because it changes what we think of God :-)
Sam