Musings Part 1

I have been struggling with my conceptions.  This morning I was reading through the Psalms.  This is where I got stuck about a month ago.  I was reading my way through the Bible when I realized one morning that I was skipping to the names of God or the descriptive names and marking them without really reading the passage.


Perhaps, I am the only one who often struggles to really read without thinking about what I am making for lunch or the to-do list that I need to write.  As for the marking the names of God, I have been trying to do an exhaustive study on God throughout the entire Bible.  It was going pretty well until I found myself making those lists as I read.  I was feeling spiritually devoid, unable to focus, unable to have clear thoughts, distracted.


So I took a hiatus and had spent some time studying what I felt was my need.  I studied about the God of all peace, Who is Himself our peace.  One morning as I was studying last week I caught myself having these thoughts about what it meant to be a mature Christian.  I was laying out a measuring rod when it struck me that God is a person.  I know, I know this is not some novel idea.  Yet for me, in that moment, it was revolutionary.


Follow my thinking, disagree if you would like, but God being a person struck to the root of my experiential problems.  I know there are times in my Christian experience where this has been a living reality.  Lately though, God is the One who is in charge of the Universe, and Who I am a bit afraid of.  It sounds bad in my head and sounds worse on paper, but it is the reality of my current experience.  Don't get me wrong I could give you the study on how God is good, and quote you scripture upon scripture to back up my position, but I find myself here amongst the narrative of a book.  I hear myself in Lucy's questions. “Is – is he a man?” asked Lucy. “Aslan a man!” said Mr. Beaver sternly. “Certainly not. I tell you he is the King of the wood and the son of the great Emperor-Beyond-the-Sea. Don’t you know who is the King of Beasts? Aslan is a lion, the Lion, the great Lion.” “Ooh,” said Susan, “I thought he was a man. Is he – quite safe? I shall feel rather nervous about meeting a lion.” “That you will, dearie, and make no mistake,” said Mrs. Beaver; “if there’s anyone who can appear before Aslan without their knees knocking, they’re either braver than most or else just silly.” “Then he isn’t safe?” said Lucy. “Safe?” said Mr. Beaver; “don’t you hear what Mrs. Beaver tells you? Who said anything about safe? ‘Course he isn’t safe."  ( C.S. Lewis~ The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe).  I find myself getting caught up in the "Course he isn't safe."  But the he in my version is capitalized.  Of course the dialog didn't really end there with Mr. Beaver saying that He isn't safe.  It is followed by this phrase, it is the phrase that makes all the difference..."But he is good."  


So in my daily experience I am digesting this idea, trying to move from the place with the disciples in the boat, it is my own voice that I hear speaking,  "What kind of a man is this, that 
even the winds and the sea obey Him?" (Matthew 8:27).  What kind of man indeed.  Yet the disciples didn't know the rest of the story... They had walked with Jesus but didn't know who He was.  Perhaps this is me also.