How do you view God? Do you regard Him as the Creator of
Heaven and earth (Gen. 1:1)? Do you picture Him as the “Heavenly Grandfather,”
who simply smiles and shakes His head at sinful man, as a grandparent might
when his or her grandchild does something wrong? Do you think of God as someone
with whom you might drink a beer with, as a country song suggests? (Society’s
moral downward spiral continues…)
I believe that God may be tired of our profane
perceptions of Him, just as He was with Israel in the Old Testament. For
example, Psalm 50:21 says, “These things hast thou done, and I kept silence;
thou thoughtest that I was altogether such an one as thyself: but I will
reprove thee, and set them in order before thine eyes.” In other words, God is
saying, “You thought I was just like you; I will reprove you and set things in
order before your eyes.”
In Acts 17:23, Paul preached the “unknown God” to the
men there, and I daresay that God may be as unknown in our culture today as He
was to these people 2000 years ago – even among professed Christians! The way
some TV preachers speak to God and about God today is embarrassing and
humiliating not only to God, but also to many of us.
We must remember that God is not a man, and whatever
He is, He is that to perfection. When the Bible says in I John 4:8 that “God is
love,” it means that God is love perfected.
When we say God is all-knowing, we mean He has an
absolute knowledge of everything. He doesn’t know more or less now that He once
did, neither is He more or less loving that He once was. I pray that we never
forget about God’s goodness or His severity (Rom. 11:22).
Man needs to have a proper, balanced view of the God
of Heaven, for Paul writes in Romans 14:11-12, “… we shall all stand before the
judgment seat of Christ. 11For it is written, As I live, saith the Lord, every
knee shall bow to me, and every tongue shall confess to God. 12So then every
one of us shall give account of himself to God.”
Do you view God as the Heavenly Father to whom you
will someday give account for the deeds of your life? Are you ready to do that?
If not, make whatever changes you need to make, and do so today. “For what is
your life? It is even a vapor that appeareth for a little while, then vanisheth
away” (Jas. 4:14).
- R.W. McAlister served as a minister to the
Anna Church of Christ in Anna, IL until his death in October 2021.This was his
own home congregation in which he grew up. R.W. was a beloved member of his
community and a popular teacher in the agriculture department at Southeast
Missouri State University in Cape Girardeau, MO. To visit the congregation's website
go to: http://www.annachurchofchrist.com/
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