See Christ, And See God's Goodness




The fear of the Lord, as a teacher once said, is the beginning of wisdom. This is probably why Don Moen just continues to push the audience to say 'God is good all the time!' in the light of the fact that he's been in the worship scene for literal decades. 

The fear of the Lord is not terror of an almighty deity. No, it is a reverence of who the Creator really is, and you simply cannot know of God's absolute holiness and power without knowing His love. Hence, the relentless declaration for all to say and hear, 'God is good, all the time! All the time, God is good!'

Now, in regards to God's goodness, there's also absolutely no way for any of us to know how good God actually is without knowing who Jesus Christ is. Christ is the greatest proof of God's love. 

God so loved the entire world through Christ. Christ did not die for a sect, for a country; He did not just die for the world at the time, but His was a sacrifice so pure and powerful that it took on the sins of all mankind. The burden was placed on His shoulders. The righteousness of the Lamb was then imputted upon all who would believe. Here, we see an aspect of how God's love is wide.

Christ's sacrifice was performed once - once and for all. This means that His finished work guaranteed the cleansing of ALL of our sins, past, present, and future. This may not sit easy for all, especially those who are genuinely concerned that this sort of message would actually encourage people to sin even more. Indeed, God's love is wide, and it is long... and for those who are confounded by the timeless aspect of His love, I suppose it would help enormously if God's love continued to be explored and imagined from other angles...

A union is non-existent until the other party confirms it. When the crucified Christ said, 'It is finished!', the exchange, and consequently, our union, was confirmed. Notice that He said 'It is finished' before saying 'Father, into Your hands I commit my Spirit'. Our union had to be confirmed, that we would be, as Paul mentioned, crucified with Christ. 

With that being said, when Christ was buried, so we were buried. When Christ rose from the dead, so we rose from the dead, completely new creations. With this implied, we can also say that when Christ ascended into heaven to be reunited with the Father, so we ascended to be reunited with the Father! How wide, how long, how high God's love is for us, that He would do so much for us to be with Him, and Him to be with us!

And it doesn't stop there, either! No, you need to understand that this is a love that Christ chose to demonstrate, in spite of His complete awareness of how sinful we've been. Tommy Walker likes to sing that He knows our name, but I believe that He knows so much more than just our names - He knows everything there is to know about each and every one of us; While we like to remember our victories, He sees even our smallest failures in a divine perspective, and He still chose to love us. 

'For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, that according to the riches of His glory He may grant you to be strengthened with His power through His Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith - that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.' Ephesians 3:14-19

How wide, how long, how high, how deep is God's great love for each and every one of us, seen through none other than Jesus Christ!


A photo posted by JbLardizabal (@_jibee) on
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jb.redeemed
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May the Lord bless you and keep you. May the Lord make His face shine on you and be gracious to you. May the Lord lift His countenance upon you and give you His Shalom. - Numbers 6:24-26