As a Grace Focused Optimist I live with The Christian Attitude, “Through Jesus, my life is a grace G.O.O.D.”
The “G” in the acronym stands for God.
I believe God is ALWAYS the One dealing with me.
Previously, I said there are five reasons why I believe this: authority, expectancy, humility, therapy, and Christianity.
But before talking about the ‘authority’ reason, you need to know where I’m coming from.
My Story
This isn’t just literary grist for my blog.
It’s the stuff I live on.
I’m no third stringer standing on the sideline in a clean uniform. My jersey’s torn; my pants grass-stained; my face bloodied; my body black and blue.
My childhood was Charles Dickens dysfunctional. My dad killed himself when I was ten. I spent my teen years in a state of emotional shock. Discouragement’s haunted my adulthood. A cataclysmic career catastrophe mauled me ten years ago. Four surgeries shared their pleasantries with me in the past four years. Last month a stent was placed in a 95% blocked artery.
I know pain like a wife knows her husband of thirty years.
And I wish I’d known earlier the truth that’s kept me this past decade as cheerful as a child who’s gotten all she wants for Christmas and calmer than a poker player holding a royal flush…the truth that God is always the One dealing with me.
So, why do I believe this?
Reason one: authority.
As a Christian, the Bible—not my reason or understanding—is my boss. So, I believe what it tells me to believe. And it tells me as often as a TV commercial mentions its product that God’s fingerprints are on everything I face.
[ctt template=”2″ link=”_EVvc” via=”yes” ]As a Christian, the Bible—not my reason or understanding—is my boss. So, I believe what it tells me to believe. @gfoministries[/ctt]
Three Biblical Witnesses to God’s Authority
I call three witnesses to the stand to testify that God’s the One dealing with me even when Satan, others’ sins, and natural disasters are involved:
1. Joseph – Fourteen people’s actions—Joseph’s foolishness, his father’s favoritism, his brothers’ selling him to slave traders, a scorned woman’s false witness, and a prisoner’s forgetfulness—create a dark alley where Joseph’s mugged. Joseph’s pains are due to his and others’ sins.
Yet when Joseph forgives his brothers he says, “You meant it for evil but God meant it for good.” (Genesis 50:20.) In other words, “God’s the One dealing with me.”
2. Job – In a single day he buries his ten children and loses his fortune in a Great Depression like meltdown. Soon a bodily ailment makes him a pariah because he looks like a leper and reeks with a nauseating stench. Three “with friends like this who needs enemies” pour salt into his wounds with dopey counsel. Job’s pains are due to Satan, sinners, and Katrina-like disasters.
Yet Job says, “The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away. Blessed be the Name of the Lord.” (Job 1:21.) In other words, “God is the One dealing with me.”
3. Jesus – Earth’s worst ever sin happens when soldiers, obeying a coward’s order, use a mallet to drive nails into the wrists and ankles of God’s Son with jackhammer force. Satan masterminds this. People revel in it as cold-bloodedly—and freely—as a serial killer his savagery.
Yet Jesus says—TWICE—that ‘God’s the One dealing with me.” In Gethsemane—his body and soul staggering under anticipated agony—Jesus prays, “Father, not my will but yours be done.” At Calvary—as anticipated agony becomes the searing severity of God’s judgment against sin scourging his body and soul—Jesus cries, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”
The Verdict
Charley, I don’t understand this.
Me neither!
But THIS BOOK called the Bible is my AUTHORITY. I take what it says at face value. And it says that GOD is ALWAYS the One dealing with me.
Frankly, I’m worse off than a killer awaiting execution if this isn’t true. My only comfort in life’s heartaches is this: “G” is for God.
[ctt template=”2″ link=”1WSef” via=”yes” ]THIS BOOK called the Bible is my AUTHORITY. I take what it says at face value. And it says that GOD is ALWAYS the One dealing with me. @gfoministries[/ctt]
To be continued. . . .
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