Hear my prayer, O LORD; listen to my plea! Answer me because You are faithful and righteous. Psalm 143:1.
God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference.
And continuing our 351 Old Testament prophecies, promises of God, fulfilled in Jesus Christ, we come to number 155: The Blessed One presented to Israel. Psalm 118:26a: Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the LORD. And, Matthew 21:9: The crowds going ahead of Him, and those who followed, were shouting, “Hosanna to the Son of David; Blessed is He who comes in the name of the LORD; Hosanna in the highest!”
Have you ever stopped to really wonder what it would be like if God was not? We wouldn’t be here to wonder. Nothing would exist. Ok, so what if God was distant as so many have believed? Far away after creating and leaving His creation to flounder on its own. There wouldn’t be love or hope or forgiveness. Or what if there were many, many gods? Civilizations have tried that. A separate god for everything and for every need and request.
But, haven’t we in our musings described life as it is now and has been for mankind living on this beautiful planet Creator God created? So many ideas, ideologies, beliefs and non beliefs and systems set up to account for all manner of things we devise in our own wisdom and understanding. Deism – a religious philosophy that teaches God created the universe and set its natural laws, but does not interfere in human affairs or the world. Pantheism – the philosophical and theological belief that the universe and everything in it are identical to God. Polytheism – the belief in multiple gods. Atheism – belief in no god or if we are honest in that belief, that we are god.
And yet. Here we are now. Created to be for a purpose. And absolutely everything that sustains our life created for that purpose. And absolutely everything that enriches and gives joy created by God. Creator God our Creator – Father, Son, Spirit. He is love working together for our good and He enabled life to flourish and grow. Family, companionship, friends, love, faith, forgiveness, grace, hope, holiness, joy, being, giving thanks, receiving, helping, sustaining, providing…the list goes on. And when we are lost and alone, He is right there and we are found because we are never truly lost, we are His. And as we turn to Him and begin to know Him, we find such gentleness in the truth of Creator God. We won’t find that gentleness of truth in deism, pantheism, polytheism, atheism, because they are constructs of human beings trying to figure out this incredible life and creation on their own apart from Creator God. We won’t find that gentleness of truth in any man-made systems of government – democracy, capitalism, socialism, communism, fascism, dictatorship, human kings, religious rule. Why? Because they are as hard on human beings as human beings are hard on themselves and on one another. And God knew when He created and designed everything to give us a choice that we would choose everything but Him.
What are you learning in this life on this beautiful planet governed by human beings? When your heart longs for more, for a truth so utterly beautiful it will change everything you ever understood about yourself and those you love, He is here. Always. And you are loved. The gentleness of the truth of Creator God is so gentle we can scarcely believe it. We, who are so used to hard truths and distancing and problems too numerous to understand, find it hard to believe there is a love so encompassing that He designed everything so that we could choose Him after experiencing everything not Him. And He inspired His Word and His Truth to be written in the story of us preserved so we could read for ourselves all the choices and results of those choices through history. And then He came and showed us the way to life with Him and with one another that changes everything and lets in the beauty and the gentleness of God’s love; and is our hope after our life lived in this time, before He returns.
***UNTO THEE, O LORD – Unto Thee, O LORD, do I lift up my soul. Let none that wait on Thee be ashamed. Remember not the sins of my youth. Teach me Thy paths and ways, O LORD. O my God, I trust in Thee. Let me not be ashamed; let not my enemies triumph over me. Psalm 25:1-4, 7. Adapted.***
