His Goodness.

Recently, some really cool things have been happening in my life.  I was able to go to Texas for my cousins wedding, go to Austria for a YWAM conference, and visit my teammate's home in Sweden!  Currently, I'm on outreach playing beach volleyball and soccer with a bunch of people along the beach.  In the middle of all that, I've met an amazing friend that has been incredible and I think sometimes..it's too good to be true (this friend happens to be a boy (wink, wink, wink) but that's not the point of this post...maybe there will be another update on that later haha) Anyways, the point of all this is with good things happening around me, I have caught myself constantly waiting for the punch line...waiting for the point where this all ends, and I go back to slaving away for my master.  Waiting for God to take away these good things and put me in my place.  I was praying and reading Jon Acuff and I suddenly realized a few skewed views I have of God. 

1. The god in my head is a jerk.
The first thing I think he’s going to do when I bump into something good is take it all away in some horrific call to somewhere else.

2. The god in my head calls me to things I’d hate.
He’s not a god that lines up the unique way he created me with a unique calling. In fact he does just the opposite. He finds something I love and then acts me to do something I’d hate. 

3. The god in my head doesn’t give good things, he removes them.
When I find myself in the middle of something good, my instinct is to wrap my arms around it and protect it from the god in my head, not thank him for it.

How did I get there?

How did I get so far away from who I feel like God tries to reveal himself as over and over in the Bible?

As I’ve said before, when God has a single moment to reveal himself to Moses in Exodus 33, what does he show him? Does he show him his might or his power or his anger? When he essentially says, “When you see me, this is what I want you to see,” what does he show Moses? His goodness.

“I will cause all my goodness to pass in front of you, and I will proclaim my name, the Lord, in your presence.”

He reveals his goodness. God isn’t a jerk. God is good.

And throughout the Bible, God doesn’t call people to things they’re not created for. He calls them to situations that awaken deep seated purpose and desires in people that God himself placed there before they were even born. Paul, the loud, bold, road tripping persecutor of Christians, is not called by God on the road to Damascus to become a quiet, shy, homebody theologian. He becomes a loud, bold, road tripping megaphone of hope.

God doesn’t call us to things we’re not designed to do.

Throughout the Bible, we also see a picture of God as someone who delights in giving. One of my favorite examples is Luke 11:11-13. Jesus says:

“Which of you fathers, if your son asks for a fish, will give him a snake instead? Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!”

I love these verses because they’re just blunt enough to break through my callused heart. Jesus uses such crazy examples! He doesn’t say, “Which of you fathers if your son asks for an egg, will give him a piece of bread?” He says, “If he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion?”

I think he uses two such wildly different things, an egg and a scorpion, because he knows we’ll be tempted to create a jerk god in our head. A god who would give us the worst thing possible. A god who’d give a scorpion instead of an egg.

I don’t know what the god in your head looks like.

But, I bet he’s a jerk. I bet he wants you to be miserable. I bet he’s got a suitcase full of scorpions with your name on it.

That’s not God though. God loves goodness. God loves mercy, not sacrifice. God loves gift giving. God loves the sick. God loves the mess-ups.

And though it may feel hard to believe if you’ve spent years with a different god in your head, God loves you.