Happy New Year! In the next week or so, expect a few posts from me on everything from anime film to reasons for believing in God's existence. But for today, here are some of the things I've been learning about God and his ways in the last few weeks and months.
- There are two paths in life, God's one and the way of fools, the latter of which will be attractive to the eye, but only the former both offering and giving things of lasting value and excellence (see Proverbs, where Wisdom calls out offers us true life, prefiguring Jesus and his role in preaching the kingdom of God).
- The Christian life is about responding to God’s goodness and undeserved love towards us by doing God’s will here on earth as part of his family, identifying ourselves with him while we wait for the fullness of the salvation that has been won for us (Romans 12, Mark 3:34-5).
- The end of all history is God’s end, planned from long ago with a special place for us who know and love him (Ephesians 1:4-6, Romans 15:8-13, or read When I Don’t Desire God).
- The call to love others in the church is God’s heart goal for us, that through this love we would show him to the world. Plus there is a great need to pray earnestly for the lost (from a talk on humility by Francis Chan).
- It's been amazing to understand over Christmas the way Jesus came to live on earth ultimately to die for our benefit, to do a work of God for the glory of God. What gets me is how this precious anointed one of God, loved from eternity by the Father in heaven with the Father and Spirit, this one, the Christ, lived through the daily hard knocks of a life of poverty and frustration and pain and disappointment - and he did it joyfully obeying his Father, he did it to rescue us and be our light and the way to God for all who take up their cross and follow him. He lived this normal life for us, growing up like us, coming under men and women who taught him and berated him. And this life he lived came with all its hurt, unhappiness, dissatisfaction, striving for more, seeing only less; with being treated evil-ly in many ways and by many people; with being shown barely any love in return in comparison to the infinite love and worship he is due. He was committed to us and to God's glory in us with his whole self. He loves us!
- It's no good trying to do something - anything - for God, or for love, without asking God's help. It's an arrogance to try to go it alone. It's a folly not to seek his help with any goal or meeting or event or time with family or with church or time to relax. It's a folly not to seek him for assurance that he cares for us, because he does. It's dumb to not ask to grow in Him. It's silly to not seek his help to become like Christ and to have a good relationship with God.
I hope you find this helpful. See you I hope during the year, and perhaps we can talk about how God is to shape our lives.
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