To Tame a Wolf: Different Views. Heard. Photo Shoots.

Yesterday a curious thought caught me.

“Why is it that people have very different experiences of God?”

If you were to say to someone, “Give me some attributes of God…” they would all start out by saying different things. Sure, a lot of the lists might contain the same things, but what things are said first by one might be the characteristics that are said last by another.

And I wanted to know why in the world this was.

Why did I want to know this? Like most of my thoughts, I am at a complete loss as to where they come from or why I all of the sudden care so much, I just know that once they take root, there is virtually no pulling them out.

Obviously then I thought of little else yesterday.

And do you know what I think the answer is? Why I think people will describe God in different ways?

Because people value God for different reasons. People go to God for different reasons, they look for different things in him.

Like, if someone has had maybe a love-deprived or skewed life up until meeting Christ, they will probably value God for the fact that he has unconditional love. And this will shape the way they see the world. They will see life in terms of loving and unloving. When God does something “good” in their life or in the life of someone they care about…it is because God is love. And to them, that is just who he is. He cannot do anything outside of the realm of love. All is love. Love is the answer. If only we could all love each other.

Or, if someone wants to change the world, then they are probably going to value God based on the fact that God is all-powerful and has given them the power of the Holy Spirit which can… change the world. Their experiences then, and the subsequent stories, will no doubt be seen and told through the lens that God is doing BIG things and God is only interested in big adventures.

If someone is a little more business-like, or concerned with how things are to be rightfully done (which you see this a lot of times in legalistic circles), they will follow Christ because he is a God of order. Life to them will be seen and duly lived in a very organized manner. Feathers don’t typically get ruffled here based on the belief that things done outside of the prescribed order are not how God does things.

All of these different views can leave a person very confused, skeptical, or even a tad judgmental. I know this because I have had all of those feelings. For instance, if I asked someone said question and they responded with, “Oh my, yes, God is merciful,” right off the bat my first thought would be, “Well…yeah…that’s true…but I would probably never describe him as that.” Or if someone else was to say to me, “I follow God because he is Just,” again, I would have to say, “Although true, that would not be in my top ten attributes….” And I can get my head all buzzing and frantic, and, I admit, typically wanting to say to them, “Sorry, your picture of God is a little off” never thinking that if they had asked ME that question my answer would probably make them say the exact same thing.

Do you see what I mean? Do you see how people view God differently? And this shapes your whole outlook on life. It shapes your relationship to people, it shapes your relationship, clearly, with the Lord; this touches everything.

Now, you might be asking, “Why is she telling us this?” and I will answer with, “I haven’t the foggiest idea.”I don’t know what any of this means, I just really think it’s true. And it gives me insight into the human mind. It is a telling sign about why people do the things they do.

And maybe it scares me a little. Maybe this is opening my eyes to the fact that I think we all, no matter whether you follow Christ because he does big things or is Just or loves you unconditionally or is grace and, to you, only grace, we all have a slightly skewed view of God and, most assuredly, a view of him that is too small.

Take me. Do you want to know the first thing I would say to answer that question?

I would say that God is constant. He never goes away. And this is why I can’t help but see him in gardens and movies and stories and dinner with friends and ice on the trees and really sensational outfits. Why? Because I believe that it goes against his nature to be anywhere but EVERYWHERE, and thus, I see him and his hand everywhere, because I am looking for him everywhere. I value, above almost all, the fact about him that he never goes away and reveals himself everywhere.

Raise your hand if you just read that and went, “Yeah, that’s not how I see God at all. She is crazy.” And I will tell you that you are right on both accounts.

But here’s the deal: I think we not only prefer, but would PRESCRIBE, that the world sees God the way we do. We become proud in our view of God. We can tout it as being the “only” way to see him. And this is where the problem rests. God is not only how we view him, he is not only how we prefer him. God is who he is, whether there are parts about him that we don’t like at all or don’t even value at all.

And I think, Wolfies, that he has to be worshipped that way. He has to be worshipped outside of how we like to see him. Because what we value about God WILL be how we worship him. And I don’t think we need to worship just the parts of him that we like, or that suit us best, or that fall into our world view best. We have to view him, in all of his glory, in all of his might, justice, vengeance, love, mercy, grace, truth, and beauty that he is. He is not a buffet. He is a “take it all…or you get nothing.”

Another thought I had, and I have no concrete basis as to whether this is true or not, but I do think we do this because we are all made differently. How we view God will probably be closely related to the gifts that we have been given. There is danger in this as well, though. We get gift-proud the same way the we get view-proud. Evangelists think that everyone should be evangelists. Those gifted with mercy are horrified that someone could hurt somebody else’s feelings. Teachers can’t understand why everyone is not teaching. We all think that how we see life is the only way to see life.

Listen, everybody needs everybody if we are going to make this gospel thing work. Remember that stuff about One Body, Many Parts? God is that all-encompassing. We need to view him as such. His ways are unknown, but we can be sure that his ways are numerous. God is big enough to use all gifts for his glory.

My one caution is that while God calls us to use these various gifts, these various viewpoints, and he calls us to worship him in his fullness, he also has called all of us to MATURITY. Yes, we will see life differently, yes we will view God differently, but we are CALLED to grow on to maturity in our faith, whether you see life as only mercy, or as only justice. The formula is Maturity+Justice. Maturity+Love. Maturity+Holiness. Maturity+Grace. And this maturity is what should be our most common ground as Believers.

Just a thought.

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On a different note, this morning I came across two verses that struck a chord with me. Let me encourage you with this:

Proverbs 15:29 “The LORD is far from the wicked, but he hears the prayers of the righteous.”

If your life is following him, Wolfies, don’t be afraid. He had heard your prayers.

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Had a photo shoot for business last week and another in the works.

Oh! girls in white dresses….