I just wanted to share a few thoughts that have been in the hallways of my mind today, It struck me as I was riding my bicycle home from the store that what Vance Haven speaks about in his sermon getting used to the dark is very true. In more areas as that brother Havner mentions in his sermon. We get used to much, we get used to sin, worldliness and all those things, someone said that much of our Christianity or things common in todays Christian world where abominable to our unsaved grandparents, whether right or wrong we can see that it is so, what was an outrage to one generation is embraced by the next. We see also in history the reverse, times of raising up a standard, aiming for the scripture says and People trying to get out of the dark. But my thoughts today was not on sin and worldliness so much, rather that we get used to God, It is incredible true God should in a sense be common and familiar to us, he is our Father, and I believe calling him daddy as a child would for his father , that spirit is a blessed one. But what I am getting at is God becoming so familiar we take him for granted, the awesomeness of who God is , how great and incomprehensible he truly is, the Holy awe for Him and His character becomes diluted into just a common thing. I live in the west, I live in Sweden, and few countries throughout mankinds history have had such a good standard of living as we do. I take for granted when I go to my kitchen and turn the faucet on there are either warm or cold water for my choice, I take for granted there will be water in my shower. I think not much on these things, I have been accustomed to these things, I take them for granted, and many would if they found out one morning that there were no warm water would complain to their landlord about the matter. And I have noticed for me after a few years from time to time it is easy to slide into such a similar state with God, we take Him for granted. He is just there in our life; I take for granted I can come to him in prayer, I can go to meetings, I can pick up my bible, in several translations and read, and I can do so many things, and take them all for granted. Yet I have the knowledge many on our earth do not have these privileges as I do, many have no church, many would risk their freedom and life for owning a bible, many more dont have all the other things as water or even a bed to sleep in, while I take them for granted, that is how things have been from my birth and throughout my life, I take them for granted. But when I think about it, how much greater should my thankfulness be? I should be weeping for joy that I can read the word every day, I should tremble in holy fear and awe that I.... a small filthy sinner like me have been saved and can at any given moment enter the holy of holies to be in his presence. God who created all things, that is such an easy phrase to spit out, but does those words mean anything to us? Or have they become common to me? Consider the universe, God created it, how vast it is! I watched a documentary about it, the Hubble telescope took a picture where millions of stars galaxies etc where visible, it would take millions of light-years to travel there..... millions of years traveling by the speed of light.... and my God who I take for granted so often, he spoke that into existence, even more amazing is I Can call him Father, and I can make him look down upon me ....tiny me, a dust in this infinite universe, in his infinite creation he can turn his eyes down upon me and look towards me with love and compassion. These things should make me tremble with joy and fear and awe, what should enter our minds as we hear the word God? I have many things enter my mind, but somewhere I have taken God for granted, he has become common to me, just as any other object in life. I think the need for me, and probably for many others, is a fresh revelation of God himself. Today much in Christianity is common, churches are common, in my part of the world, believers are common, at least those who claim to know God, bibles are common, talk about God is very common, theological discussions are common. But how common is men that utterly fear God and can enter a place of awe by hearing the word God, men and women who live by sight in their spiritual being, men and women that have gazed upon God, the creator of all things.... Do I even realize I know him? How often do I litterly fall on my face before him just because he is? Far too seldom, that God would reveal himself to me, that he would be God in my life. Also I realized, the true eternal God we can never be accustomed to, he can never be common, since he is all else but common, He is God, the eternal and most high being. My lonnging is that I could be as enoch....
He walked with God.....
It is so easy to live this life and not see God one time, I fear multitudes of believers having lived one, ten, twenty years and never once seen God for who he really is. He is just a common thing, person to them, he is there and all things that are involved in the Christian life are just there, as the water in the faucet, as the light when you hit the light switch. Its just there, nothingwow about it, but take someone who never seen these things, a man who has lived in some remote jungle for all his life, bring him in my house and I bet he would gowoooooow when I showed him the faucet with running water, I bet he could spend hours just turning the thing on and off. He would be amazed at this thing. And sadly I am rarely amazed at God, God help me and reveal himself to me afresh.
God bless you all
Christian
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