An.Unstoppable.Verb
Someone asked me today where God was in my list of priorities and it really got me thinking. Not about where he was on that list but more about the way we view God in this world. The way we view him through our lens of understanding. It’s not uncommon to hear advice like “Make sure God is your number one priority.” Or how about this, how many times has someone asked you about “your spiritual life.” Its rather normal dialog for bible believing, God fearing Christians these days isn’t it? And it gets me thinking. Did God do all that he did to merely become a priority? To be a morning routine for his followers? Does he even like the ritual of daily devotions?
We say these things because it’s the language that we know how to use to convey the questions that we want to ask but it really got me to start thinking. What picture are we painting without even realizing it? What themes in this faith system have we built without intending to build?
The language God uses all through out his scripture is a very vibrant, active, living, breathing sort of language. For instance Moses even asks God what his name is in Exodus 3 and God simply responds with “I AM who I AM.” God’s name in essence is a verb, an active statement of simply being. We also see in the creation story in Genesis God speaking and creation simply responding to its Creator.
His language is undeniably full of life and action and ours tends to be rather dead. If our languages for instance were to be compared to something tangible like lets say, a friendship. His friendship would be full of expectancy while ours would be full of expectations. His friendship would be organic and natural while ours would be orderly and artificial. Where his friendship wants to spend the entire day with us, our friendship wants to put him on the top of some priority list. Where his friendship wants to invade our entire being, ours simply wants to section him off to the spiritual side of who we define ourselves as.
I mean, to say that God is my number one priority, is to say that I… have… other… priorities. To say that God is at the top of my list, is to say that there… are… other… things… on… my… list that don’t include him. And how about that spiritual life hu? To label one side of my life spiritual is to aknowledge that there are other sides to my life that, well, aren’t spiritual.
In no way am I knocking morning devotions and I’m sure God cherishes every single moment spent with his children in those quite times. In no way am I trying to say priorities in life are a bad thing. However, I think God created us in his image to be in an unstoppable relationship with his creation. He didn’t send his Son to die on the cross so that he can sit on the throne which rests at the top of our to do lists. He sent his Son to die so that he may invade every single fiber of our being. I encourage you to invite him in and give him free reign. I hope that you come to see that God is so much more than a priority. I pray that you come to know that he is An.Unstoppable.Verb
-Billy
