Over the past few weeks, I had the opportunity to speak to a couple of people about their relationship with God. I asked them questions about how they pictured Him –
Is He a wise old man in the clouds?
Is He angry all the time?
Is He super chill and lets us do what we want?
The answers varied, but there was something quite astonishing (or maybe not) that stood out in a lot of their responses.
Many of them believed that God was disappointed in them. Many of them thought that God was really angry, and that He was waiting with a gun pointed at them, just waiting for them to mess up again so that He could fire away.
A lot of them saw God as a parent – but an angry one, who was just waiting to say, “I knew you’d mess up.”
It wasn’t just people who never prayed. Some of them were people who actually knew what Jesus had accomplished on the Cross who felt this way.
And I realised, that many times, that is how I feel too.
I too, at times believe that God is disappointed in me – that I have let Him down way too much, and that He may not love me anymore.
It is amazing how many of us still live in a place of guilt and shame, despite having experienced the love of God sometime in our lives.
It should surprise us, that we believe that. Until we realize that the problem isn’t so much psychological as it is spiritual.
You see, there is an enemy out there – a real spiritual enemy.
And this enemy – the enemy – hates you.
But we forget that as much as the enemy hates us, he hates God so much more.
The enemy hates God!
God is a parent – He is a father. And if you ask any good parent what the worst thing an enemy can do to them is, they will tell you –
“The worst thing that an enemy can do to me, that will hurt me the most, is to convince my children that I do not love them.”
Isn’t that true? Isn’t that absolutely painful for a parent to see? To watch their child believe that he or she is not loved?
Now, if you’re someone who’s felt that God does not love you, even after knowing the price He paid for you, does that not make sense?
Does it not make sense that you’ve been repeatedly told lies about how the Father feels about you by an enemy who absolutely hates Him?
God loves you – beyond measure. He feels for you. He acts for you, out of compassion.
He sent His Son to suffer, be tortured and to die for you.
It’s time to stop listening to an enemy who hates you and your Father.
It’s time to stop listening to the lies.
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