More Refuge Than Threat....

In my Threat or Refuge post, I fessed up to being royally pissed at God for several years…all the while diligently trying to cram him in the box others told me he fit it. He just would not accommodate me and get in the darn box (nor will he get in anybody’s box, by the way, but that is a whole other post) So what finally set me free from my God grudge? One thing was in trusting him to lead me….and finding a few good friends (hi, annie!!) who were willing to make the journey with me….and step off the beaten path with an open mind…and a heart trusting that God would not give a stone to his children who asked for a fish.

Keith gave me some good advice several times during our series of long “discussions” about God…discussions which mainly focused around the POE (problem of evil) and total sovereignty…things we did not/do not see eye to eye on. These were my main areas of angst. To my way of thinking, Keith’s way of thinking rendered God untrustworthy….a trickster who resorted to manipulation and deceit to get me to do his bidding, all the while proclaiming in scripture to choose….that he does not lie….etc. etc. Keith comes to a different conclusion than I do and can make a good case for the way he sees things…. Anyway…his advice at the time…..

He told me to not base my relationship with God on what I saw him doing to other people but rather to base my trust in God on his relationship with me.

“Has he been trustworthy?”

“I suppose…yes.” (but he still pisses me off)

He told me that I should tell him that...not only that I was mad at him but that, based on his interactions with me, I would trust him until he proved that he could not be trusted. To stop looking around and analyzing what he was doing with others/to others. In other words, MYOB.

Byron Katie teaches pretty much the same thing….

There are only three kinds of business in the universe: mine, yours, and God's.

But the most important thing I did was to fix my eyes on Jesus….the image of the invisible God…if you’ve seen me, you’ve seen the Father….and he became my filter for scripture and the character of God. Then things started to fall into place and God became more refuge than threat….