Sunday 1 February 2009

All for love...

We have been following a series on Grace and Gideon in our evening services over the past couple of weeks which Ive really been enjoying or perhaps to put it a better way Ive got a lot out of it and learnt a lot.Something that just seems to keep popping up for me at the minute is just how incomprehensible God is. From studying Job who's suffering is inflicted by the Satan with God's approval. But suffering is not the only topic to be found in Job but also the journey that Job takes with God coming to the point of submission because he will never understand God's ways or means. Then there is the divine name of God...'I AM who I AM'. This is something that has always intrigued me...there is just so much meaning in those 2 very small words I AM. 2 words that sum up the essence of my God who was, is and evermore shall be...transcending all space and time...any wonder we could never possibly understand all that He is.

This was the conclusion I had come up with regarding the sacred name for my Old Testament exam but never got to use...but that's a whole other story!!!

In the diverse cameos which emerge in an attempt to unravel the complexity of the origin, meaning and significance of the sacred name YHWH, a rich tapestry of challenging ideas can be taken for our worship today. When we enter God’s presence is there the same echo of excitement which evokes an ecstatic cry from the depths of our being as we reflect on the otherness and greatness of God in creation and all of life. We often have a casual familiarity which can easily degenerate into a performance. But as it is revealed in the culmination of the passage in Exodus in which God’s name is revealed, Yahweh’s name and nature exists in all time, in all directions, for ever and for all generations. God is essentially the God of presence in every conceivable experience that life throws at us demonstrating that the unpronounceable I AM speaks in the life death and resurrection of the One who claimed in John 8:58 – ‘before Abraham was , I AM’.

It can really be quite mind bending stuff which i guess for me is where faith comes in...He is the great God...Yahweh...I AM...and He cares about me...how awesome is that. The creator of the universe who breathed life itself wants to know about me...even though He already knows everything about me, He still wants me to chat to Him about it!

And it was this I was thinking about as we thought a little more about grace and prepared for communion on Sunday night and there was a verse that kept running through my head...

May you experience the love of Christ, though it is too great to understand fully. Then you will be made complete with all the fullness of life and power that comes from God. Ephesians 3:19

How can we understand a love that is prepared to die for us...a stranger...but that's just it...we aren't strangers as God knows every little intimate detail about us and just loves us that much.

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