When you think of God, what comes to your mind? I have had many views of God throughout my life. As a young child, I was told He was my heavenly father. I therefore saw Him as someone just waiting for me to make a mistake, and when I did He had a paddle in His hand to smack me on the side of my head. My father never beat me, but he was very stern and did not tolerate mistakes or wrongdoing. As a teenager, I really did not think about God all that much. In church, I was too busy joking and being extremely casual in my view of God because this was the way my parents were. I went through a period of time where I viewed Him as my buddy, who knew I would make mistakes, but that was alright because I was human and sin was just something we did. I was confident He would forgive me so I just continued in my worldly ways.
Then at the age of twenty-one when I was in the Air Force, I truly gave my life to Christ and received the salvation that came through His shed blood. Almost immediately, God began to show me who He truly was. I learned that my view of Him was so small; that He was so much bigger than I could ever imagine. It has taken me years to grasp what I know now, but I understand that I have only scratched the surface. What I want to do now is ponder the greatness and majesty of this God we now serve.
First, let us look at His eternality. God has always been. Before anything else, God existed. He was here before space, time, or angelic beings, and there was never a point when God came into existence because He never was not. He also will never not be because there will never be a point when He will cease to exist. From before the beginning to after the end, He is.
And He is omnipotent, meaning infinitely powerful. There has never been a power greater than His, and there never will be. It is impossible to even come close to what He can do. We get a glimpse of this in the book of Job, where he declares the greatness and majesty of God in His creation. “He stretches out the north over empty space and hangs the earth on nothing. He wraps up the waters in His clouds; And the cloud does not burst under them. He obscures the face of the full moon and spreads His cloud over it. He has inscribed a circle on the surface of the waters, at the boundary of light and darkness. The pillars of heaven tremble and are amazed at His rebuke.” Job 26:7-11. This chapter speaks of His mighty work of creation and his power to hold it together. Then we read in verse fourteen, “Behold, these are the fringes of His ways; and how faint a word we hear of Him! But His mighty thunder, who can understand? All that He did is but a small, tiny part of His power.” Job 26:14. From nothing, He created everything in an orderly fashion.
Along with his omnipotence, He is also omniscient. God has infinite knowledge. He knows absolutely everything because He created everything. He created all matter, energy, time, space, physical laws, and life. The apostle John wrote the following, “Worthy art Thou, our Lord and our God, to receive glory and honor and power; for Thou didst create all things, and because of Thy will they existed, and were created.” Revelation 4:11. God also spoke through Isaiah regarding creation. “Remember the former things long past, For I am God, and there is no other; I am God, and there is no one like Me, Declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient times things which have not been done, saying, My purpose will be established, And I will accomplish all My good pleasure;” Isaiah 46:9-10. He created all things according to His wisdom, knowing everything perfectly, including all events in all times.
He is also omnipresent. God is everywhere at all times. There is no place we can go where He is not. God spoke through Jeremiah saying, “Am I a God who is near, declares the LORD, and not a God far off? Can a man hide himself in hiding places, so I do not see him? declares the LORD. Do I not fill the heavens and the earth? declares the LORD.” Jeremiah 23:23-24. If God fills the heavens and the earth, then He is everywhere. His spirit is in every nook and cranny of creation thus He is always by our side. He is infinitely greater than anything else. Again in Isaiah we read, “It is He who sits above the vault of the earth, And its inhabitants are like grasshoppers, Who stretches out the heavens like a curtain And spreads them out like a tent to dwell in. He it is who reduces rulers to nothing, Who makes the judges of the earth meaningless.” Isaiah 40:22-23.
And lastly, His love for us is infinite. “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ, just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before Him. In love ” Ephesians 1:3-4. And “By this the love of God was manifested in us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world so that we might live through Him. In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.” 1 John 4:9-10. God loved us before we were created, so much so that Christ’s death was conceived prior to creation. This is true Infinite love. And nothing better can be said regarding this then what Jesus Himself said, “Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends. You are My friends if you do what I command you. No longer do I call you slaves, for the slave does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all things that I have heard from My Father I have made known to you.” John 15:13-15.
God is not just another being among many. He is mighty beyond all comprehension and wonderful beyond all words. He created and sustained all things with but a word or a thought. And He knows our every thoughts and deeds; nothing is hidden from Him. He raises rulers and removes rulers. He answers to no one. His ways are above our ways, and His thoughts above ours, just as the heavens are above the earth. There is nothing or no one higher than Him. And the beauty of this is that He loves us. He loved us before He created us. He knew we would fall and thus He prepared the way of salvation before the foundations of the earth were laid. He loved us so much that, not wanting any to perish, He gave His only begotten son as the payment for our sin.
If the President of the United States or some other important dignitary were to ask us for some time to talk, we would probably do whatever we could to meet with them. We would be honored that he even knew about us and wanted to hear from us. So many people fall all over themselves to see a famous movie star or professional athlete, let alone spend some intimate time with them. Now, when the all-powerful, all knowing, all loving God who created all existence and fills the heavens and the earth with His presence, wants to spend intimate time with us, do we have the same reaction? I will leave that up to each individual to ponder in their own hearts. But I say, how can we do anything less then give our all to this unfathomable being who truly loves us this much. We should cry out as David did, “O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is Thy name in all the earth, who hast displayed Thy splendor above the heavens! From the mouth of infants and nursing babes Thou hast established strength, Because of Thine adversaries, To make the enemy and the revengeful cease. When I consider Thy heavens, the work of Thy fingers, The moon, and the stars, which Thou hast ordained; What is man, that Thou dost take thought of him? And the son of man, that Thou dost care for him? Yet Thou hast made him a little lower than God, And dost crown him with glory and majesty! Thou dost make him to rule over the works of Thy hands; Thou hast put all things under his feet, All sheep, and oxen, and also the beasts of the field, The birds of the heavens, and the fish of the sea, whatever passes through the paths of the seas. O LORD, our Lord, How majestic is Thy name in all the earth!” Psalm 8:1-9. This should be the way we think and see Him. Do we see Him this way? Do we strive to spend time with Him more than friends or famous people here? We all need to take some time for self-examination. It will be worth it.
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