Sunday, April 28, 2024. Continuation of the Joy of Jesus Series.
“Happy are the people whose God is the Lord.” (Psalm 144:15)
Your view of God is the most important thing about you. You are living out your view of God. You are being molded into the image of the God you think exists. What you think, what you say and what you do are all determined by your view of God.
If you are living the life of a “practical atheist” there’s a reason. This is someone who says he believes in God but acts as though He is irrelevant and unimportant to his everyday life, the decisions he makes, what he thinks about and does. He doesn’t pray or consult Him in any major or even minor decisions in his life. He thinks God is distant, undetached from people and unconcerned about having a relationship with anyone. He’s too uncaring to be intimately concerned with anybody. And so he lives his life as though He does not exist. But the Bible’s view of God is just the opposite. He notices every sparrow that falls from the sky and has the hairs on every head numbered. He cares deeply about how we think and what we do. He loves us as a husband loves his bride and a mother loves her children.
To find the correct view of God we must look into God’s word where He tells us everything we need to know about God so we can bear the image of God and live the best life possible on this earth. We see everything we need to know about God in Jesus Christ; by His works and words He gives us the perfect picture of God.
I’ve already stated that Jesus was the happiest man on earth when He was here (Heb.1:9). Religious people are basically not happy. Look at their faces in church and you will see many unhappy people. A man got into the choir one week and never again. When I asked him about it, he said he couldn’t stand looking at so many unhappy faces in church! Religion will make you sour because it gives you the wrong view of God.
Religious people are happy at other places. Put that same sad church face at a ballgame and he’s excited, shouting and having a good time. He’s high-fiving people! With the religious world, even among church members, God is like the Pharisees imagined Him to be – too righteous to have anything to do with sinners. They picture Him as cold, legalistic and unmerciful toward those who make wrong choices and mess up their lives. They become like the God they imagine and look down on sinners as being unworthy to eat with.
In contrast to that we see Jesus hanging around sinners all the time. He went to sinners. Invited Himself into their homes to eat and fellowship. We see this in Luke 15 where Jesus has accepted an invitation to Matthew’s home for a party. There you will see the Pharisees critical about what Jesus is doing. They are all in one house among all kinds of notorious sinners. Jesus hears their murmuring and knows their problem is they have a wrong view of God. So He sets about correcting their view of God by telling a parable with three stories. It’s one parable with three stories. This is for emphasis; as if to say, I want you to really get this message about the correct view of God....Click here to read more:
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