What He is Not
The foreshadow theme of the Old Testament points to the coming of the Messiah. All the imagery, symbols, narratives, commandments, etc point to the Messiah, that is, those things of the Old Testament are just foreshadow of things to come. The four gospel accounts then function to narrate the life and ministries of Jesus. The Book of Acts, and subsequently the epistles and the entire New Testament exhort believers to live a life worthy of Christ.
From Genesis to Revelation, the central theme of the Bible is God. It spells out how we are to live our lives worthy of His calling. It tells us who He is, and who we are, and it is definitely all about Him. One thing it is not – it is not about us.
Jesus came to die on the cross for our sins because it is the will of God to reconcile man to Himself. It is not about us. The Bible is not a set of promises to make our lives richer, more grandiose, more comfortable and more pampered. God did not give us His Word to pamper us, to heal us when we hurt our little finger on the right (although in His great compassion He does), to give us rain on a sunny day, or to give us sunshine during a thunderstorm. (Yet in His mercy, He still gives).
Neither is the purpose of His Word to promise us multi-million (or multi-thousands for some of us) business deals, to appease our girlfriend/boyfriend because (s)he is angry with us, or to give us a parking bay in a shopping mall on a busy Saturday evening, or to turn all red lights on the highways and byways for us so that we can speed through to our destination at the shortest time possible! Yes, God does give us those things, but those things are not the reason why Jesus came two thousand years ago.
Undoubtedly, most of us are pampered Christians. We are often angry with God when things do not go our way. We have treated God as though it is His responsibilities to ensure our lives are problem-free and stress-free. When problems come looking for us, we blame God for His failure to live up to His promises. Then, when we wanted something so badly, we claim we know God’s promises and we held Him accountable and responsible to what we believed is true. We expect God to come to our rescue in all our petty problems and childish acquisitions. We have reduced God to a mere immortal servant.
Yet, He is not.
I have come across people claiming “God, You have promised me in Your Word that….” yet, we do not meet the conditions to qualify us to claim for those promises. We are selective in what we want to believe in the Bible. We approach the Bible with a “mental grid” because we only read those “feel good” verses that promised us blessings and prosperity. We have chosen to neglect and ignore and close our eyes on the other parts which are as equally important.
But yet, God in His mercy, forgives us and lead us to Himself.
God is awesome and majestic, full of glory and resplendent in His beauty. His standard of holiness is strict and firm, yet not impossible. He made a way for us to reach Him and bridged us through His Son Jesus. We are privilege that we can approach the throne of grace with boldness and confidence.
God. We worship Him.
He is not a servant, waiting to serve us. When we get ourselves busy with church “ministries” and “church activities” as well as “church programs”, we are not doing Him any favour. Sometimes I think our busy-ness do us much dis-favour instead! Neither is He hungering and desiring us to serve Him through some form of church involvement. (Although church involvement is great!). He is not a waiter, waiting for us desperately to give Him a “command” through our “prayer requests”.
Instead, we should be the ones to wait on Him. We should be the ones to go down on our knees and ask Him for His instructions for every task at hand. We should be the ones to ask Him if there is anything in our lives that are not right, that we have to make right to. We should be the ones to cover our faces in repentance and ask Him for forgiveness for that angry thought we have of that unreasonable client! We should be the ones to kiss Him at His feet, to prostrate before Him and wait for Him to tell us when to get up. That, is our role.
My tears well up as I close my eyes to see Him. That sense of remorse that I am unworthy and a nobody, yet He allowed me the privilege to be in His Presence. Oh, that deep assurance, that awesome feeling that comes when He comes. God, He created us and made us, the King of kings and Lord of lords.
When we bow our knees before Him in humble adoration, ego and pride take no residence in us. At times, past undealt & hidden sins hindered His blessings to flow to us. And no, not financial blessings, but the blessing of knowing Him and being with Him. When we go down on our knees, humility takes dominance.
That should be the only way we approach Him.
Till we really know how to go to Him, we will always see “I” as the center and the reason why He came. (And that is a faulty thought).
