The Lord is awe-inspiring, fearsome, fascinating, intriguing, and majestic in his radiant splendor: breathtaking! Here is what I saw of him today and what came to my heart and mind in ,
Anything of the Lord capture your heart from Scripture today? Share what moved you about him from your Bible reading today. I'd love to hear from you!
If you have someone you would like to receive these ruminations, send me their email address. I'm happy to add them to the list. If you are receiving this and would like to be removed from the list, just reply and let me know.
“God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him.”
Just what is meant by “living in God”? John here is providing us an insight that only those who love know God, so “whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him.”
I suspect that many of us have differing perceptions of what it means to “live in God.” Some may view living in God as living a life that God finds acceptable, “good behavior” so to speak. Moral and ethical behavior, “victory” over the particular sins or temptations one finds himself beset with. Others may view living in God as having done a great work for God as in participating in establishing a mega-church sized fellowship complete with multimillion dollar facilities, a successful praise and worship band, etc. Or possibly establishing a missions board that fields workers in third world countries spreading the gospel message.
While these kinds of things might demonstrate hard work and zeal for the gospel and reflect efforts to do those things thought to be pleasing to God, my thoughts drift elsewhere this morning as I consider what it means to live in God. It seems to me that to live in God is life itself. Living in God to me carries the notion of living life in a “God-centric” framework as opposed to “me-centric” – what I accomplish, what I am doing. Life in God seems to me to be not so much about me, my accomplishments and what I do but more about God – who he is and what he does, his purposes, his desires, his joy. Not that what we do is not important. After all, it is the things we do that express what is in the heart. Heartfelt love and devotion to God finds its expression in the things we do for him.
To live in God also seems to me to be tuned into God himself. I suspect many of us have known those who have done things for God but for some reason don’t seem to experience an intimacy with him, even as they set themselves to a task for him. Maybe we have been that person at times in our own lives. I know I have. Living in God surely carries the idea of knowing what God is thinking as we immerse ourselves in his self-disclosure to us in the pages of Scripture. Communing with him in prayer in a way that we begin to sense, as we are guided by the Scriptures, what he might be feeling about things. We grieve when we sense God is grieved over something. We rejoice when we encounter that which we know brings joy to God’s heart. We desire what it is that God desires, not just for ourselves but for him and those around us.
John presents living in God as a fact, not a goal, not something to pursue. Either we live in God or we don’t. Either we belong to God or we don’t. From what John says here, we as believers do live in God and if we can take a break in beating ourselves up for a moment, I think we all would acknowledge that our hearts are drawn hopelessly to him. We love and adore our Savior and it is he we seek to please, it is his desires we are drawn to and his purposes we long to labor at.
Truly our lives are lived in him, we live in God and he lives in us!
Just what is meant by “living in God”? John here is providing us an insight that only those who love know God, so “whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him.”
I suspect that many of us have differing perceptions of what it means to “live in God.” Some may view living in God as living a life that God finds acceptable, “good behavior” so to speak. Moral and ethical behavior, “victory” over the particular sins or temptations one finds himself beset with. Others may view living in God as having done a great work for God as in participating in establishing a mega-church sized fellowship complete with multimillion dollar facilities, a successful praise and worship band, etc. Or possibly establishing a missions board that fields workers in third world countries spreading the gospel message.
While these kinds of things might demonstrate hard work and zeal for the gospel and reflect efforts to do those things thought to be pleasing to God, my thoughts drift elsewhere this morning as I consider what it means to live in God. It seems to me that to live in God is life itself. Living in God to me carries the notion of living life in a “God-centric” framework as opposed to “me-centric” – what I accomplish, what I am doing. Life in God seems to me to be not so much about me, my accomplishments and what I do but more about God – who he is and what he does, his purposes, his desires, his joy. Not that what we do is not important. After all, it is the things we do that express what is in the heart. Heartfelt love and devotion to God finds its expression in the things we do for him.
To live in God also seems to me to be tuned into God himself. I suspect many of us have known those who have done things for God but for some reason don’t seem to experience an intimacy with him, even as they set themselves to a task for him. Maybe we have been that person at times in our own lives. I know I have. Living in God surely carries the idea of knowing what God is thinking as we immerse ourselves in his self-disclosure to us in the pages of Scripture. Communing with him in prayer in a way that we begin to sense, as we are guided by the Scriptures, what he might be feeling about things. We grieve when we sense God is grieved over something. We rejoice when we encounter that which we know brings joy to God’s heart. We desire what it is that God desires, not just for ourselves but for him and those around us.
John presents living in God as a fact, not a goal, not something to pursue. Either we live in God or we don’t. Either we belong to God or we don’t. From what John says here, we as believers do live in God and if we can take a break in beating ourselves up for a moment, I think we all would acknowledge that our hearts are drawn hopelessly to him. We love and adore our Savior and it is he we seek to please, it is his desires we are drawn to and his purposes we long to labor at.
Truly our lives are lived in him, we live in God and he lives in us!
Anything of the Lord capture your heart from Scripture today? Share what moved you about him from your Bible reading today. I'd love to hear from you!
If you have someone you would like to receive these ruminations, send me their email address. I'm happy to add them to the list. If you are receiving this and would like to be removed from the list, just reply and let me know.
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