For some reason when I turned on the TV in the bedroom this morning, the channel was set to The Blaze. This was curious to me because I had not been watching it last night, nor does my husband watch that channel. The first image was of a very bundled-up-in-coats Glenn Beck in what appeared to be a foreign place. He went on to explain about how the country of Slovakia is helping those who are unable to help themselves...taking in Christian refugees fleeing Iraq. When few other places will do so, this tiny country in the European Union is opening its arms to rescue these Christians, who have lost everything except their lives and their faith. They were willing to lose everything for the sake of their Savior. And, Slovakia has taken them in, demonstrating the love of God. Glenn stated that there are families willing to take in these Iraqi Christians here in America, but that our government will not allow it. This makes me ashamed to be an American. God will richly bless Slovakia for their care of His own. Wait and see.
Well, it is Day Two of the Advent Season. Tozer's(1) meditation today focuses on the amazing mystery of God, the Limitless One, limiting Himself for our sake. Why did God do this? And, why did He do this for humankind but not for other created beings? He did not do it for fallen angels, after all, and we are told in Hebrews that man is "a little lower than the angels"... We can neither know the mind of God nor can we fathom the depths of His love. The apostle John (3:16) tells us that it was because God "so loved" the world that He did this.
If you are a parent or if you become one you know (or will) that one of the most painful things in life is to be at odds with your child. When I was growing up there was an expression, "the generation gap". Basically, it referred to the societal difference between the older generations and the younger. But, at a more fundamental level in the 1960s, it was about a younger generation rejecting the moral code of the older. If you are part of a family that has not experienced this, then you are highly favored and greatly blessed. The pain is tremendous and especially so when the children reject the parents' Christian faith.
Essentially, God saw this unbridgeable gap between Himself and his creation, mankind, a gap that the man had caused through his rejection of God's way; and, His pain was unbearable. Knowing that the only way to reconcile His beloved creatures (us) to Himself was for Him to become one of us and make the supreme blood sacrifice, He did it. He, who can do anything, did the unthinkable.
As the apostle Paul exclaimed when pondering this truth: "Great is the mystery of godliness!" (1 Timothy 3:16). Here's the full verse:
And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up into glory.
"What is there in us? If we cast our eyes upon God, and then enter into a comparison, alas! shall we come near this highness which surmounteth the heavens? Nay, rather can we have any acquaintance with it? For there is nothing hit rottenness in us; nothing but sin and death. Then let the living God, the well-spring of life, the everlasting glory, and the infinite power, come; and not only approach to us and our miseries, our wretchedness, our frailty, and to this bottomless pit of all iniquity that is in men; let not only the majesty of God come near this, but he joined to it, and made one with it, in the person of our Lord Jesus Christ! What is Jesus Christ? God and man! But how God and man? What difference is there between God and man?
We know that there is nothing at all in our nature but wretchedness and misery; nothing but a bottomless pit of stench and infection; and yet in the person of our Lord Jesus Christ, we see the glory of God who is worshipped by angels, and likewise the weakness of man; and that He is God and man. Is not this a secret and hidden thing, worthy to be set out with words, and likewise enough to ravish our hearts! The very angels could never have thought upon it, as here observed by St. Paul. Seeing it pleased the Holy Ghost to set forth the goodness of God, and show us for how precious a jewel we ought to esteem it, let us beware on our part that we be not unthankful, and have our minds so shut up, that we will not taste of it, if we cannot thoroughly and perfectly understand it." (2)
Sources:
(1). Tozer, A.W. From Heaven. 2016. Moody Publishers, Chicago, IL.
{Please forgive the flaws in today's formatting and so forth. I am blogging via iPad, since my computer died a quite sudden and complete death yesterday evening.}
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