10 of Your Blessings (It's a Start for Counting)

1. God created humanity. There was no need for an incredibly magnificent God like ours, to take any interest into creating humans. We did not need to exist for God to find fulfillment, though yes, our purpose is to please God.

2. God placed man in an ideal world with luscious fruit and luscious fruit, and no animals hunting us humans. Wouldn't it be an incredible sight to watch dinosaurs walk with humans, and not be trying to eat them? 

3. But God wasn't a deistic type God, which would have made sense. He has no reason to be interested in us as individuals, but He stayed and communed with man.

4. (Also, God didn't just destroy the world altogether after Adam's sin. We know that one day He will create a new heaven and a new earth, so He obviously had that ability. But He didn't use it after man corrupted the ideal world that He placed them in.)

5. Indeed, even after man messed things up, He remained in a relationship with man, going to great lengths to set up a sacrificial system that allowed the Israelites to enjoy a relationship with him, albeit a broken one.

6. Further, He refused to leave it as only for the Israelites. Contrary to negative popular opinion, God allowed His covenant with Abraham to extend to non-Israelites, like the men of Gibeon, Barzillai the Gileadite, and so on.

7. Then the Lord wasn't content with keeping tne relationship as purely broken. Jesus then laid down His crown to be born from a virgin in a manger.

8. Jesus went through and lived a perfect life, then went and died on the cross to take away the punishment for all our sins, to all who will accept His death as a substitution for their punishment. Raising again the third day, we have a promise that we too will raise again to life eternal.

9. Furthermore, the Lord refused to leave it to just the Israelite, but opened up His route of salvation to the Gentiles. All people now have the opportunity to get to have that intimate relationship with Jesus Christ that brings with it salvation.

10. Even still, God doesn't just give us eternity, and then become a deistic type God when it comes to this world. He still cares for us, and tells us that He will "never leave us, nor forsake us." We have His words that through our struggles, we will have Him strengthening us.

How about a Psalm of Praise (with only Minor Points of Application)

  There is a great truth, which cannot be suppressed by any Christian. I am fairly certain that all denominations can and do ascribe to this one belief. Disagree as we might on issues ranging from the mundane to the doctrinal, from the legitimacy of divorce to the extent of God's predestination, we all agree on one fundamental point (among others too).

God is pretty dang awesome! Kinda an incredible transcendent being that I ultimately can't try to pen down in words. A God who had the unlimited power necessary to speak this world in existence, and the unlimited knowledge to know what would all transpire after He did so. 

So why does He even care about the lives of us lowly human beings? From a purely logical standpoint, I must admit that the God of the Deists makes sense. The God who is big enough to create this world should have no reason to seek any pleasure or present any interest in it. 

But our human logic just can't understand the transcendence of God's reasoning and inclinations apparently. Still the question should be raised. Why does God even care about the lives of us lowly humans? 

It is a question that is raised at least twice in the Old Testament, though from two vastly different attitudes. 

We already looked at Job's response to the Lord's immanence and care for the plights of men, and honestly this post is about praise, not why we should be glad that the Lord cares to convict us of our sin. 

So I shall move on and conclude with the praise given by David for the same thought process. Looking at Psalm 8, 

"O Lord, our Lord, how excellent is thy name in all the earth! who hast set thy glory above the heavens. Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings hast thou ordained strength because of thine enemies, that thou mightest still the enemy and the avenger. When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained; What is man, that thou art mindful of him? and the son of man, that thou visitest him? For thou hast made him a little lower than the angels, and hast crowned him with glory and honour. Thou madest him to have dominion over the works of thy hands; thou hast put all things under his feet: All sheep and oxen, yea, and the beasts of the field; The fowl of the air, and the fish of the sea, and whatsoever passeth through the paths of the seas. O Lord our Lord, how excellent is thy name in all the earth!" 

Oddest Rebuke in the History of Mankind

I have made it to the end of the book of Job. As most of you know, the book ends with the Lord rebuking Job for four chapters.

As I was reading Job truly to figure out what Job was being rebuked for, I was paying rather close attention to what the Lord said, so that I could determine whether my prior guesses were correct.

But the rebuke doesn't like a typical rebuke. Outside of maybe Job 40:2, the Lord says absolutely nothing of what Job's sins are, and what Job has done that has engendered this rebuke. Instead God spent His time explaining His transcendent power and majesty.

Naturally, this rebukes produces very much of the desired effect (how could God fail in His efforts?). In Job 42:5-6, Job responds,

"I have heard of thee by the hearing of the ear: but now mine eye seeth thee. Wherefore I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes."

And there you have it - repentance comes as the result of the Lord's rebuke. Repentance comes because of a further knowledge of who God is. I don't believe it is too much of a stretch to say that ultimately all true repentance will come from a greater knowledge of who God is.

Perhaps if we want to live a life of godliness, we ought to start by gaining a greater knowledge of who God is. And we also ought to continue by gaining a greater knowledge of who God is, and you know what? We ought to end by gaining a greater knowledge of who God is.