God has really been showing me alot about His character through the old Testament lately...
I've told some of you there was this girl out tree planting this year, who has a heart for God, but just can't seem to get past a certain thing in her life. I don't want to be too arogant, but I believe its just that she can't see how beautiful God sees her as, and how beautiful God has made her through His son's sacrifice. Really hard for me to see.
I've seen it several times, I believe. Actually, lots of times. The interesting thing was I was reading a Philip Yancy book at the time called, "The Bible Jesus Read," and it talks about how the major prophet books are in alot of ways God telling us how he feels. Interestingly enough, he uses a metaphor of a young girl, who he adopts and raises into a beautiful queen. This is a metaphor for the nation of Israel. The woman he loves, raises, and cares for eventually starts to prostitute herself to the world, breaking God's heart.
Of course, my experience is only a small representation of what happened to God as well. Then the other night I had to speak, and during the talk, I was able to share my heart on that issue, about girls not seeing how beautiful they are to God. Some people got offended by it, and I struggled with what I should do about it.
At the peak of my anxiety, I cracked open the Bible and guess where I started reading? In Ezekiel, where God is expressing just that metaphor I was talking about. It was pretty crazy. I'm not 100% yet, but I believe this is the first time ever God has ever prompted me to say something potentially offensive, and I did. I really hope some good things come out of it. And I am praying that I would be able to express myself more clearly to anyone that misunderstood, but yeah.
The point is, getting to know God is sometimes not pleasant, in a secular way at least. God has been hurt alot, and to understand that, we have to really be sorrowful sometimes, but we have a promise, "Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted." More on this later.
3 comments:
hey Dan,
thanks for droppin' by... comments are encouraging... it is tough to know when God is leading you to say something that is potentially hurtful... all about dicernment.
Tawmis
I was sort of shocked to hear that people would be offended to hear that they are beautiful in God's eyes. Maybe i'm missing something here but that actually really bothers me. I'm glad that you had the courage to stand up and say something that isn't easy for everybody to accept, but my word, offended? That is pretty troubling when you can't even say "in God's eyes you are beautiful" without someone getting uppity about it. Man,....disturbing. Good for you though for sticking to your guns after the fact. Tell me if i am missing something here cause I kind of feel like i am. later tommy
Well, basically Cory, a couple of people found what I said offensive and condesending because they felt I was saying that "all girls look for acceptance and love in guys." I wasn't saying that at all, and though I will never claim to remember my exact words, I know for sure that the point about God seeing girls as precious and beautiful was way more central to, at least what I to say. I think its just the enemy kinda distorting stuff. And the fact that some people were probably convicted by that. There is a sequel to this story by the way... for another time.
Post a Comment