IT'S ALL ABOUT GOD by Terry Benson

“In the beginning, God…”   Genesis 1:1 (KJV)

It doesn’t say, “when God began”, it says, “in the beginning, God…” Before there was a beginning there was God. Before you or I had a beginning, there was God. But the opening line of the Holy Bible is more than just a statement of God’s precedence to time. The story of all life begins with this sentence which continues by saying “…God created the heavens and the earth.” Not only is God before time and before us, He created both. It’s by God’s will and imagination and power that we exist.

We humans choose to believe otherwise. Following in the footsteps of our ancestors from Eden, we go down the path of self-determination, self-realization and self-gratification, inventing stories of primal origins that exclude God and His creative initiative. We think it’s all about us, so that’s how we live. And we reap the consequences – misery, purposelessness, and the specter of only oblivion beyond the grave. Such a universal tragedy: the Father who loves, and His children who know Him not.

If only we can get the message through our thick sin-scarred souls—God is the Center and the Source, we are not. Out of His initiative galaxies exist. From His heart and hand, we exist. Truth is, He never stopped taking that initiative with us. His voice still speaks through nature, through still small whispers in our thoughts, through the historical reality of Jesus the Christ. And if we will quiet ourselves long enough to hear, long enough to see, long enough to know, then His initiative of grace may just evoke a response of gratitude or admiration – maybe even worship. Because true worship begins with the acknowledgment that it really is all about God.

T.B.

Think about it:  What is the center of my life? What preoccupies my attention, time and resources? How is He speaking to me? How will I respond?