The God you know?

Each and every morning I have a choice.
And each and every morning the choice is pretty much the same.
Start my day off here...

Or here...

I generally choose the latter.

And today I was pondering this.
Even talking to God about it.
Explaining to Him why I do it this way.
And this is what we came up with....

Have you ever noticed how each one of us has a different perspective on how God is and who God is?
Have you ever found that to be odd?
I mean it makes sense for there to be a small margin of difference based on our individual personalities and experiences.
Take for example, the four New Testament gospels. Each one seeing Jesus through a slightly different lens.
But it was always the same story.
The same Jesus.
The same heart of the same man.
Each perspective with a small margin of difference, but none of them taking away from the true picture of Jesus and who He is.
Whereas it seems that among Christians today, it is difficult to find many who truly know Jesus. As a matter of fact, many seem to have widely different versions of who they believe Him to be. Versions where the margin of difference can be astronomical.
With much room for error.
And few of them look like the Jesus of the Bible.

Has this ever struck you as odd?

Let's pretend you wanted to get to know me and due to the fact that I was away on a year long trip to Disney World...
because that is exactly where I should be...
you were forced to get to know me through interviewing a handful of my closest friends..
I would sincerely hope that you would come away from the interviews with a true understanding of who I really am.
I would also hope that my friends would not give you a distorted view of me and that you would not only find their individual accounts to agree, but that you would like me even better after having not even met me.
If that makes sense
because of course it does.
Just nod and smile.

Hear me.
I am not trying to compare myself to God or to imply that you should want to get to know me as much as you would want to get to know Him.
Or to suggest that He is on a year long sabbatical.

I am just saying that it seems like few of us really know Him.
Myself included.
And not only do we not really know Him, but in our ignorance of Him, we are sharing a false view of Him to those around us.
We are undoubtedly confusing people and turning them away.
Which is sad.
It is sad that He has gotten such bad press when He is sooo good.
When He is exactly everything we need and want.
And everything that makes up love.
And all that is good.

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But if we are honest, what do we admit?
That we are afraid of getting to know Him?
He might ask us to change something.
We are afraid of what He might find out about us?
He might not like us.
Other people only like us because we allow them to see what we want them to see.
We already know Him?
We have heard the stories and He seems sort of rigid. No fun. Life would be all about rules with Him.
This couldn't be farther from the truth.

Perhaps it is time to do this.
Pick up the Word of God.
Ask Him to wipe away all preconceived notions of who we think He is.
Ask Him to show Himself to us for who He really is.
Which is....
a delight.
a passionate, caring, fun, exciting, hilariously, thrilling delight.
Able to carry all the cares of the world.
And yours.

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If this isn't the God you know.
My friend, you are missing out.
We all are.