Wednesday, July 8, 2009

Seeing God



Isaiah 6:1-8; Job 42:5

Isaiah saw God. He was mourning the loss of King Uzziah. The Lord in all His grandeur sat above the temple’s room and spoke.

He was humbled by the sight of the seraphim flying and singing praise songs to the Lord. Isaiah believed himself unworthy to go before God. He expressed the issue. “Woe to me, I am a man of unclean lips.”

Job, also, was mourning.–his loss was personal; he lost everything. God eventually asked him a series of questions only He could answer. Through this questioning process, Job saw who God is and who he–Job–was.

Can we see God in our lives? I believe we do, as we progress through our lives: When people perform kindnesses for us, when others give us cheery thoughts, when they remember we can’t have certain foods or snacks.

How can we respond to these temporal kindnesses that reveal God to us? Isaiah and Job were both humbled. We should feel the same way. And we need to adopt an attitude of gratitude to those God uses to make those deeds real to us.

Monday, July 6, 2009

A Child's Table Grace


As children, those of us of a certain age were taught a prayer to say before meals.

God is great, God is good
and we thank Him for our food.
By His hand we are fed,
Thank you, God, for our daily bread.

We really didn't understand what we said.

“God is great,”―He’s the strongest being in the universe. Our Creator can handle anything.

“God is good”―His goodness is made real to us by His provisions for us.

“And we thank Him.”―We should express our gratitude for all He bestows on us.

“for out food.”―Without proper nourishment, we would become very ill and most likely perish.

“By His hand”―He provides us with all our needs.

“we are fed,”―We receive all our gifts and sustenance from God.

“Thank you, God”―We should verbally express our gratitude to Him.

“for our daily bread.”―Our thanks to God should be for the basics of our lives.

Had I understood what I was saying when I learned it 60 years ago, I probably would have had a better understanding of my relationship with God earlier in my life.

God Alone

  Jesus and the children at our church's prayer walk.          I will both lie down in peace and sleep;  For You alone, O LORD make ...