| Good morning everyone, Our theme for this month: “Great thoughts from great Christians” Our Bible verse for today: “He tends his flock like a shepherd; he gathers the lambs in his arms and carries them close to his heart.” Isaiah 40:11 (NIV) Our thought for today: “Think love when you think of God” This morning I want to return us to A.W. Tozer’s statement which we considered yesterday, “What comes to your mind when you think of God is the most important thing about you.” Why? Why is it the most important thing about you? Because, as we’ve learned in previous devotional messages in this series, human beings intuitively know that there is a God. As Solomon taught in Ecclesiastes 3:11, God has placed a little piece of eternity in the heart of every person. He created us that way. There’s a space in the human heart which can only be filled by God and which remains empty until it is. Humans spend their lives seeking and searching to fill that empty place in their hearts. Deep down, we want God – or at least a god. Consequently, we spend our lives seeking either the God, or a god. Once we settle on either the one true God or a god offered to us by the world, we know we need to find a way to please Him, and this is where our concept of God becomes so important. Horace Bushnell was a Pastor and writer who lived in the 1800s. Commenting on Isaiah 40:11 (above) he wrote, “Gentleness in a deity – what other religion ever took up such a thought?” It’s true. The ancient gods of the Greeks and Romans were tyrannical, mean, and distant. Many other pagan gods went so far as to require human sacrifice. Even pseudo-Christian faith systems like Mormonism follow a god who is stern, strict, and demanding. Bushnell went on to argue that the way you think of your god will determine much about you as a person. That’s exactly the point that Tozer made almost 100 years later when he wrote, “What comes to your mind when you think of God is the most important thing about you.” What you think about God, and what you believe it takes to please Him, will shape your thinking and your personality. If he is a fearful and demanding god, and if you sincerely do want to please him and be in a right relationship with Him, you will tailor your thinking and your actions in life to appease that fearful and demanding god. But if your God is a God of love, kindness, mercy, and grace, that belief too will be reflected in not only how you think, but also in how you live. What you believe about God will shape you as a person. As I noted in yesterday’s devotional, the dominant theme throughout the Bible is the love of God. Therefore, that should be the first thing that comes into our minds when we think of Him and that should cause us to live in a state of feeling loved. And, as we all know, when a person has an overwhelming sense of being loved and of being in love, it changes everything about them. Again today, as I did yesterday, I want to encourage each of us to spend some time just thinking about, mediating on, and enjoying the great truth that “God loves you!” God is love, and that’s how He wants you to think of Him. God Bless, Pastor Jim |
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