GOD: 'BIG' ENOUGH FOR ALL, 'SMALL' ENOUGH FOR ME

No matter the level of personal advantage, or disadvantage, permitted by God, everyone can expect of God, a level of love that reaches for us all... a love which waits, even though He is so great as to exceed definition. He permits some definition for the sake of relationship. The same One who preceded all things, as Creator, has put His special creation on a platform of favor, that the 'whosoever' of the 'world' might know Him! GOD, THE AUTHOR OF ALL, HAVING AUTHORITY OVER ALL, IS BIG ENOUGH FOR ALL, YET... small enough to be responsive to my details, on the basis of love.

So, we get hit with remarkable snowfall and frigid temperatures this week, along with substantial ice. After 20 minutes or so, shovel in hand, with grit and machismo and even a 'hallelujah anyhow', I find the winter beast not being so impressed. In my own style, I whimper. [very privately mind you]. Now, God, who can take it [winter] away, does not, but His Word of grace informs me. God, who can momentarily give me supernatural strength, does not. God who can temper time and all subject to it, does not. I'm still seventy, feeling like eighty in the knees... but His Word of grace informs me: "For My thoughts are not your thoughts, and your ways are not My ways... For as heaven is higher than the earth, so My ways are higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts. For just as rain and snow fall from heaven and do not return there without saturating the earth and making it germinate and sprout, and providing seed to sow and food to eat, so my word that comes from My mouth will not return to Me empty, but it will accomplish what I please and will prosper in what I send it to do." (Isaiah 55:8-11)

Whether I relate to it or not, what He does, in the grand scheme of things, will prosper, and give Him pleasure. While it is hard to reconcile gratitude with profound shivering, therein is my personal 'homework,' that my struggle, our struggle, rightly applied can and ought give Him the glory. He is sovereign, and I am, radically, not. Even within dire difficulty, He is due all glory, honor, and praise!

IS GRATEFUL GLADNESS YOUR BANNER?! It should be. "Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the fist earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. I also saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down from heaven from God, prepared like a bride adorned for her husband. Then I heard a loud voice from the throne: 'Look. God's dwelling is with humanity, and He will live with them. They will be His peoples, and God Himself will be with them, and will be their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; grief, dying and pain will be no more, because the previous things have passed away." (Revelation 21:1-4)

While being perfected in this present struggle, know that, out there, within that 'cloud of witnesses' your living testimony is encouraging someone else's salvation. "This is the day that the Lord has made, and I will rejoice and be glad in it." Lace up your boots and bless the Lord! But also, be wise enough to know when it's time to appreciate returning to the warmth of the home God has given. On the horizon cometh a brighter day. Amen. In everything, thanks! Even now. Amen!

PRAYER: Heavenly Father, thank You for Your faithfulness towards us, being big enough or small enough to meet us at our point of need, while always being God, perfectly righteous and perfectly loving. May today be a day of heeding, as Your Spirit affords us the clarity to move well, and wisely in this fallen world. Because You have touched our hearts with an 'eternal Spring', we shall purpose daily to remember such a grace, and consider our Winter, as a dear adornment to polish with faith. May all within our immediate world, be further warmed by it, and encouraged to 'look and live'.
Bless You Jesus! God be praised!