The Lord is awe-inspiring, fearsome, fascinating, intriguing, majestic, and full of splendor: breathtaking! Here is what I saw of him in Zephaniah 1:17, 3:17,
"I will bring distress on the people and they will walk like blind men, because they have sinned against the Lord. Their blood will be poured out like dust and their entrails like filth."... "The Lord your God is with you, he is mighty to save. He will take great delight in you, he will quiet you with his love, he will rejoice over you with singing."
Look again at the seventeenth verse of both chapters 1 and 3 in this book! Judgment and love! Not judgment in pastel colors and not love in pastel colors, but judgment and love in bold, breathtaking strokes of the brightest, most vivid colors!
God reveals himself to us in the pages of Scripture. It is the primary purpose of our Bibles. The Lord produced the Scriptures through his prophets whom the Holy Spirit carried along to write what they did for us. Two very clear things the Lord wants us to know about him is his intense sense of justice and his boundless love for us, for all mankind. When Moses asked God to reveal himself to him the Lord spoke these words, "The Lord, the Lord, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin. Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished; he punishes the children and their children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation."
How can anyone miss the two defining character qualities of God? He tells us plainly "abounding in love" and "he punishes". His love is intense and so is his judgment. We will never plumb the depths of the love of our Lord in this life. Likewise, the nature of his wrathful fury is terrifying. So many within the church miss the revelation God gives about himself. They seem to paint a portrait of him in soft pastel colors. Our God is anything but that! On the one hand, some see him as their lovey-dovey daddy that wouldn't harm a fly. On the other hand, others, and this is a big group these days, attempt to minimize our understanding of this boundless love of our God. They reject the notion that God loves all mankind as in "For God so loved the world that he sent his one and only Son..." John 3:16. They reject the notion that Jesus Christ endured the pain of payment for all the sins of all mankind, as in, "He [Jesus Christ] is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for ours but also for the sins of the whole world." The atonement of Jesus Christ is efficacious for every human being to have ever lived! However, it is only appropriated if we embrace him in faith.
I never want to lose sight of God's terrifying judgment nor his boundless love for us!
Anything of the Lord capture your heart from Scripture today? Share your thoughts of worship with us from your Bible reading today. We'd love to hear from you!
Trevor Fisk
trevor.fisk@gmail.com
trevor.fisk@gmail.com
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