The Good and Beautiful God

I just finished a great book and want to share some of the encouraging things that I've just read. IF you're looking for a simple book revealing the wonderful truths about our God, I encourage you to pick this one up.

The main point of this book is to encourage you to fall in love with the God that Jesus knows...a revelation from the Son's perspective. The New Testament reveals God as Jesus experienced Him in His earthly life.

1. God is good

Jesus tells us in Matthew 19:17 that "There is only one who is good." God LOVES us and will give us good that is not dependant upon our behavior. Just as sunshine and rain are given equally to saints and sinners with no distinction, so God gives blessings to all without regard to behavior. The author also explained how Jesus beleives in this goodness even when our circumstances are too grim to believe. He (Jesus) believes for me. He beleives even when I cannot. He prays even when I cannot. I participate in HIS (Jesus') faith. God's goodness is vast and consuming, we must only accept it.

2. God is trustworthy

The God Jesus reveals would never do anything to harm us. He has no malice or evil intentions. He is completely good. And that fact that God is all-knowing and all-powerful makes his goodness even better. Jesus became human so he could know all of our trials and temptations as a human, and even in all those times he put all his trust in the Father, we must simply do the same. God is present. God is pure. God is powerful. God provides. Our Father pardons. God longs to protect us. When Jesus was in the garden, pleaing with his Father to "take the cup" we share in that prayer. A cup is anything in our lives that we are given that makes us want to question God's goodness. The thing to remember is that He is out for our good, no matter what situation he puts in our path.

3.God is generous

Jesus reveals a God who does not demand, but who gives. His resources are never exhausted and God is moved with compassion because he sees our needs. God wants you to know and love Him. God hates sin because it hurts his children, and he is CRAZY about us! He doesn't always give us what we WANT, but He does always give us what we NEED.

4. God is love

God looks are us with compassion, even when we have done the very worst to God we could possible do. God, it appears, is very fond of sinners. Not their sin. He loves us with grace, and the problem is that we don't like grace. It seems unfair, because God is gracious to all. It smacks against our performance-based-acceptance narrative. The point is that only one thing seperates us from God, and it is not our sin. It is our self-righteousness. Our self-righteouness does not turn God from us, but us from God.

5. God is holy

God is holy and just. The wrath of God is not a crazed rage but rather a consistent opposition to sin and evil. God's wrath is mindful, objective, rational response; it is an act of love. Wrath is not a permanent attribute of God. Love and holiness are part of his essential nature, wrath is contingent upon human sin. Wrath is God's holy act towards sin. Wrath is what humans experience when they reject God, it is a part of our free choice. I want a God that hates anything that hurts me. God cares deeply about sin because it destroys his precious children; God longs for holiness in us because it is the way to wholeness. God's first and last word is always grace.

6. God is self-scarificing

Maybe vulnerability is true strength. Maybe sacrificing yourself for the good of another is not a sign of weakness but is the greatest power the world ever knows. The glory of God himself lies in self-giving. The cross is God's way of doing all he could do for us, yet we still doubt His love for us. Our weakness prevents us from being able to forgive. Our fear keeps up from surrender and sacrifice. Jesus did not have to die, Jesus chose to die.

7. God transforms

God not only wants us to be reconciled, he wants to transform us. He not only took away the guilt of of sin, but also the power of sin. Those who are Christ-followers not only recieve the merit of his work on the cross but actually participate , by faiht, in the crucifixion. God is no longer dealing with you on the basis of sin. You are forgiven forever. You are also a completely new creation. You are one in whom Christ dwells. Your glory is not in what you do, but in who you are.

Transformation takes time, we are not changed over night. But the promises of God that Jesus revealed happen in us when we decide to want to get to know the Good and Beautiful God.