Can You Picture Him

Have you ever heard about another individual so much that you pictured them in your mind? That person was so vivid in your mind that you could break down of their character, their humor, their nastiness—that before you really met them; you had an image of this person in your head? We may even have expectations of them because of this image. Do we do the same thing to God? Despite what we may think, I believe that since we have no image of him, no clear understanding of God—because his ways are so much higher than our ways and his thoughts are higher than our thoughts—we find ourselves looking desperately for something to piece together his character.

My Inner Image

For the last few months, I have been challenged with my inner image of God. I think of him has loving, strength, dependability and intensity; then I am starting to see that my ideas of these qualities are flawed, so my inner image of God is flawed. Let me explain. When I think of love, I think of my husband, Sam. Sadly, my childhood didn’t have too many people that would show me the true meaning of love. When Sam came in into my life, he was that for me. He was patient and, sometimes, aggressive in his love, but Sam always looked forward to the time when he could—do what he did best—love the woman God gave him with all his heart and soul. After being married for some time, Sam adopted something new. Don’t tell anyone but, there are times he gets up in the middle of the night get a drink of water and every time he would get up or lays down he would gently kiss my shoulder. He has been so dedicated to love me that I can count on one hand the times when I wanted him to do something for me, and he refused out of laziness or lack of motivation. He lives to serve God and me. He does all he can to put himself third and make me his priority.

Now in this description, you have a small idea of what it may be like for me to be loved by him. My opinion of love comes from him so, many times when I think of God’s love, I think of Sam. That’s so romantic, right? There is still a flaw in my image of God even though Sam is a very loving husband. You see even though; for a husband, Sam has gone above and beyond to make me happy, he still failed me many times. There were quite a few times that he did things because he loved me but it almost ruined our marriage. There were times when he tried to protect me, but he unexpectedly exposed me. Even the best version of love could never compare with God’s perfection.

If I go to God expecting love—as I know it—I would expect God to do what he thinks I need but not listen to my hurt. I would assume that God’s version of making me priority would expose me to morert and pain. You see even the best version of someone is a flawed depiction of God because my example is a limited man with finite knowledge of who I am and who I am called to be.

So the question lies, do we give God the attributes of those that are around us to get a better picture of who he really is? In the next two months, I want to go on an adventure to see if we can remove our image of God and adopt who he is. We are going to start off with, “God will never…” How would you finish that sentence? God will never…(what)? So now I personally want to finish that sentence with my thoughts but I to be more productive, I can’t. I want to finish it with what the Bible says.

God Will Never Lie…

Do you genuinely believe that God would never lie? Well, maybe you are thinking of a few your experiences in life that makes you question your real thoughts. God says, he will never leave us.

⁵ Keep your lives free from the love of money and be content with what you have,because God has said,

Yet there were many moments when you felt completely alone and abandoned by God. God also says he will  no weapon formed against us would prosper

“no weapon forged against you will prevail,
    and you will refute every tongue that accuses you.
This is the heritage of the servants of the Lord,
    and this is their vindication from me,” Isaiah 54:17
Is there a time in your life that you felt anything the victim of the enemy’s attacks? Or maybe you were taken advantage of, you were battered, bruised and you see no evidence of protection. Are there times you felt lost and without direction even though God promises to lead and guide us? You felt lost, clueless and incompetent; and you thought that he gave you no clue as to which direction to go in.

Trust in the Lord with all your heart
    and lean not on your own understanding;
⁶ in all your ways submit to him,
    and he will make your paths straight.. When we read that God is not a man that he should lie, we have to wonder why not.

Pro 3:6

…Because…God is Truth

Someone said it like this, and God can’t lie because God’s words come to life the moment he speaks it.

The tongue has the power of life and death,
    and those who love it will eat its fruit. Pro 18:21

God’s very words produce exactly what he speaks. The world we live on is an example of that. Water, light and living creatures were brought forth just because he spoke it. As mere humans, we think that God CHOOSES not to lie versus the reality that God cannot lie. It is utterly impossible because once it words leave his lips, it becomes real.

When we think of God not lying, we find it be too favorable but there are some things in the Bible we wish were a lie right? Bad company corrupts good character 1 Corinthians 15:33. That means that God is saying when you surround yourself with bad friends it will corrupt you no matter how much you feel you are the light (one more). It does not matter how much you want to excuse it away or believe that you are the exception…remember God does not lie.  As a people, we would like to look on God’s character to find flaws, but we want to erase his other side of who he is.

Think about a time in your life that you feel that God failed you, is it ever so possible that the results may have been our hope that God’s word was a lie? Maybe we were hurt by a relationship that we knew was not good but we pursued it anyway cause we thought we could be the exception to the rule. Maybe you went against authority, like a parent, because you thought you knew better and the results did not wield what you thought. If we can take a moment to think for a second, do we try to find a loophole in God make up to rationalize that our wrong decisions weren’t that wrong?