Category: God is…

inexplicable pure, perfect love, passion in your heart, anguish in mind, uncertainty, doubt, an element of despair, God's love, infinite in being, perfection, pure spirit, invisible, passions, immense, eternal, incomprehensible, almighty, most wise, most holy, most free, searches our hearts, knows the mind of the Spirit, God works for the good of those who love Him, called according to His purpose, God is for us, God has chosen, at the right hand of God, God's essence, unadulterated love, tough love

inexplicable pure, perfect love

Beth - blogger, coach, consultantLeave a comment

Those who believe that they believe in God, but without passion in their hearts, without anguish in mind, without uncertainty, without doubt, without an element of despair even in their consolation, believe in the God idea, not God Himself. ~Miguel de Unamuno

My friend, pastor Franc Ortega, suggested that trying to explain God’s nature is venturing where angels fear to tread.  I’m starting to think he might be right…
Today, I want to venture into talking about God’s love, His essence, His nature.  And I feel is so shallow, not even getting close to what I wanted to achieve.

We read in the Westminster Confession:
There is but one only, (a) living, and true God:(b) who is infinite in being and perfection,(c) a most pure spirit,(d) invisible,(e) without body parts,(f) or passions,(g) immutable,(h) immense,(i) eternal,(k) incomprehensible,(l) almighty,(m) most wise,(n) most holy,(o) most free,(p) most absolute,(q) working all things according to the counsel of His own immutable and most righteous will…”

I can see in this a small glimmer of what we read in Romans 8  this morning:
…the Spirit helps us in our weakness.  … And He who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes … in accordance with God’s will. 
…And we know that in all this, God works for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to His purpose.  …
If God is for us, who can be against us? …will He not also… graciously give us all things?  Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen?… Who is He that condemns? Christ Jesus, who died… is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us.  Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? …
No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us.  For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God…

So, what is God’s love?
We all know the passage of 1 Corinthians 13… what Love is… But, I want us each to have a personal experience with it today.

You will each find in your bulletin, a little yellow card.  As you will notice, there are blanks in it (if the side facing you is in Spanish, you can turn it over and find English on the other side).  I want you to all put your name in the blank. For example: Beth is Patient; Beth is kind.

So, let’s do this together then:
________________ is patient;
________________ is kind;
________________ is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude.
________________ does not insist on her/his own way;
________________ is not irritable or resentful;
________________ does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth.
________________ bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
________________ never ends.

Now… I don’t know about you, but it makes me feel a little like a hypocrite and liar.

I may strive to be those things, but that’s not my true nature.  I may be able, when consciously trying, be some of those things, some of the time, but I cannot for the life of me live 24/7 in that state.

Many make the mistake when writing or speaking about God’s love of seeing it as amiable weakness, a good-natured indulgence: somehow reduced to sickly sentiment, patterned after human emotions.  But if this were true, then God would be fickle, and every place in the Bible where it states that God is unchanging would be a lie.

I don’t think this is God’s essence.  In a general sense, yes: God loves all of creation (the universe, the cosmos).
But, God’s love is more than this: it is pure, unadulterated love – a love that pulsates through death and life, that breaks through the path of angels, demons and powers, a love that is timeless, making the present and the future irrelevant, a love that is greater than any height, depth or anything else in creation.  It doesn’t matter where we go or what we do, it can reach us at the ends of the earth.

Think of going to the mall with a group of friends, and stopping at the food hall to have lunch:  one of you can ask for sushi, while another has vegetarian stir-fry and another one Indian cuisine or just a good ol’ hamburger and fries.  Most us would like God to be like that.
Where I can come to with my requests or order for the day, and simply ask and get what I want.
But true love doesn’t work that way… not really…
Pure love is often harsh.  Seemingly uncaring.

Parents call this “tough love”.  We all have our experiences with tough love – whether on the giving end or the receiving end.  And if on the receiving end, it sometimes takes us years to understand the “love” that was shown to us.

Jeremiah 31: 3 reminds us:
I have loved you with an everlasting love; I have drawn you with loving-kindness.
And yet… God lets us choose whether or not we want to accept His love.

First John:
God is love.  Whoever lives in love, lives in God and God in Him.  … There is no fear in love.  But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment.  The one who fears is not made perfect in love.

If I truly trusted in God, understood the magnitude of His presence and love, I would have no fear.  I would have trust that His will is for my good.

Thankfully, God is not sitting there waiting for me to get my act together, God hasn’t washed his hands of me until I straighten up and stop making mistakes.  No, God understands me fully and completely.  His loving eyes look past my acts and look straight into my heart and mind, at my motivations, my fears, my uncertainties.  God doesn’t get impatient with me.

David says:
O Lord, you have searched me and you know me.
You know when I sit and when I rise, You perceive my thoughts from afar.
You discern my going out and my lying down; you are familiar with all my ways.
Before a word is on my tongue, You know it completely, O Lord. …
Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from Your presence?  

I know that even failing just once, just one act of impatience or lack of kindness, makes me unworthy to stand before the power of this love.  And yet God still loves me, because that is the very nature of his being.  God is love.

Exodus 34: verses 6 and 7 teach us:
The Lord, the Lord, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, maintaining love to thousands and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin…

I know the definition of true love – and yet, I focus on MY problems and MY needs, I am self-seeking and rude to other people, easily angered when my plans don’t work out the way I wanted, holding a grudge against that person that I am sure rained on my parade – even if accidentally?

Where do I get the nerve to insist that God allow me into His presence carrying all of my personal baggage with me? I want God to let me contaminate His presence of pure love?

Jesus teaches us:
For if you forgive men when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you.  But if you do not forgive men their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins.

Hate, anger, envy, bitterness and other negative feelings towards others hurt me more than what they affect the person towards whom they are directed.

Like my friend, I want God to prove His love for me by pulling me back from the brink of disaster, rather than accepting that He wants me to love myself enough not to walk over the edge.

God’s love doesn’t mean I get to walk through life totally unscathed.  It means that I have a choice about how I will react to the injuries and scars.

It’s only when we understand the magnitude of God’s love – the purity & perfectness of this agape – that we can begin to understand our gospel reading today.
Matthew 13: 44-52
The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field.  When a man found it, he hid it again, and then in his joy went and sold all he had and bought that field. 
Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant looking for fine pearls.  When he found one of great value, he went away and sold everything he had and bought it.

When I recognise the power of the love that God is, then I start to understand that I need to get rid of everything that is “me, me, me”, so that I can be filled completely with the purity of this perfect love.  I will sell all I have just to have this one treasure.

I can’t make this decision for someone else – I don’t go out and buy the field or the fine pearls for anyone other than myself.  What I have discovered is for me alone.  I may tell others about it.  I may share with others.  But I can’t choose for anyone else.
1 John 4 tells us:
The one who does not love does not know God, for God is love.

Let’s go back to our yellow cards in your bulletin, and this time I want you to fill in the blank with your favourite name for God, whether that be Yahweh, the Almighty, Elohim, Creator, the Lord God, Jehovah, the Prince of Peace, as you feel closest:
Jehovah Jireh is patient;
Jehovah Rapha is kind;
Jehovah Nissi is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude.
Jehovah Shammah does not insist on her/his own way;
Jehovah Raah is not irritable or resentful;
Jehovah Tsidkenu: does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth.
El Elohe Israel bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
The Great I AM never ends.

When I understand the nature of God, the immensity of God’s love, the purity and perfection of the choice to love, it’s easier to understand my need to be emptied of myself and filled with God’s Spirit.
You may remember that I started this morning with a quote:
Those who believe that they believe in God, but without passion in their hearts, without anguish in mind, without uncertainty, without doubt, without an element of despair even in their consolation, believe in the God idea, not God Himself.

Seeing that God is perfect and pure love should cause anguish in my mind, uncertainty as to my ability to please God by my own naïve efforts, doubt as to whether I will ever be fully filled with God’s love that drives out all fears… it leads me to understand my guilt before God for my negative feelings and harbouring bitterness, my unworthiness, my failures … but if I believe that this is what God truly is, then I have to believe that God is able to transform me.  It doesn’t depend on me… God has already done it.  God is willing and able to overflow this love into me, if I am willing to say yes, I want to be emptied so that I might be filled.

I want His Spirit to help me in my weakness, to know that in all trouble, hardship, persecution, famine, nakedness, danger or sword that God works for the good of those who love Him in spite of it all.
I want to conquer all of these things, because I believe in God’s perfect love:
For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in creation, will be able to separate me from the love of God…
Because that love lives inside of me; it IS me.

acupuncture, allowing the infinite to flow, the flow of energy, the flow of power, God is light, the power of light

Acupuncture – and understanding God…

Beth - blogger, coach, consultant1 Comment

Let’s start with the basic tenet from the Bible: “God is light and in him is no darkness at all.” (1 Jn 1:5), and let’s take it literally:  God is LIGHT.

So, what is light? Light, scientifically speaking is particles and waves, which is a range of electromagnetic radiation that can be detected by the human eye, or photons.  Photons, which are massless particles and bursts of energy “quanta” which move at the speed of light. Electromagnetic waves start when an electric charge jiggles back and forth. In fact, you can actually think of an electromagnetic wave as being two waves in one – it has both an electric field and a magnetic field that move together. Being more simplistic, light is energy.   The Bible also says that God is an all-consuming fire.  Once again, we’re talking about energy.

Question by a 14-year-old: “doesn’t everything have atoms or at least mass and weight? if it doesn’t, then is it really there?”

Scientific answer:  “Lots of things aren’t made of atoms. Light and other electromagnetic waves are an obvious example. Individual protons, neutrons, and electrons don’t constitute atoms until they’re combined.”

So, while God doesn’t have atoms and mass and weight, if God is light, then as electromagnetic waves, God can exist even though we can’t see God.

So… then let’s look at what Chinese medicine tells us about the human body:  As the basis of Acupuncture, Shen Nung (oldest known acupuncturist) theorised that the body has an energy force running throughout it.  This energy force is known as Qi (pronounced Chee).  The Qi consists of all essential life activities, which include the spiritual, emotional, mental and the physical aspects of life.  A person’s health is influenced by the flow of Qi in the body. If the flow of Qi is insufficient, unbalanced or interrupted, Yin and Yang become unbalanced, and illness may occur. Qi travels throughout the body along “Meridians” or special pathways.  Acupuncture is the insertion of very fine needles, (sometimes in conjunction with electrical stimulus), on the body’s surface, in order to influence physiological functioning of the body. The acupuncture points are specific locations where the Meridians come to the surface of the skin, and are easily accessible by “needling” and Acupressure. The connections between them ensure that there is an even circulation of Qi or energy.

How does Acupuncture work? Scientists have no real answer to this; as you know many of the workings of the body are still a mystery!  By some unknown process, Acupuncture raises levels of triglycerides, specific hormones, prostaglandins, white blood counts, gamma globulins, opsonins and overall anti-body levels.   The “neurotransmitter” theory states that certain neurotransmitter levels (serotonin & nor-adrenaline) are affected by Acupuncture.  One of the most popular theories is the “Gate Control” theory.  According to this theory, the perception of pain is controlled by a part of the nervous system which regulates the impulse, which will later be interpreted as pain.  This part of the nervous system is called the “gate”.  If the gate is hit with too many impulses, it becomes overwhelmed, and it closes.

If the body has this energy flow, and there are pathways that the energy is supposed to flow through, and the pathway gets closed because of the person’s emotions or stress, then this will lead to imbalance in the energy throughout the body, and leads to illness.   We have all read, at some point in life, that emotions are the root cause of almost every injury and illness. Anger, fear, unworthiness and other emotions get ‘stuffed’ into the body, over time these limiting emotions weaken the physical body creating stiffness, aches, pain and general discomfort, which eventually can cause more serious conditions like tumours and cancer.  And so acupuncture is used to open the pathways that were closed, restoring the energy and balance to ALL organs and areas of the body, and reestablishing good health.

So… what does ANY of this have to do with God?

Let’s say that we accept that God is (at least, one facet and part of God is) ENERGY.  Pure and simple energy.  And energy flows and moves.  We can also, scientifically, prove that WE (human beings) are ENERGY and this flows through us.

As we’ve already seen, negative emotions (what the Bible refers to as SIN) block the energy flow through our body and may lead to illness.  If we believe that we are vessels put here on earth to do God’s purpose, and that as God is light and we are to be filled with His light, we need to have open pathways for the energy to flow, any sin in our lives will block the flow!  God, being the gentleman that he is, is limited to those areas of our life where we allow Him to flow freely.

That anger that I am holding onto, that resentment or bitterness, it not only affects my relationship with other people, but it directly inhibits me from having an openly flowing relationship with God!  The pathway is somewhat (or in some cases) totally blocked.  I can’t be used as a vessel for God to my full potential, because I have a blockage.

Consider one more thing:  1 Peter 1:16 “Be holy, as I am holy”.  If God is “holy” and God is light, and there is NO darkness in Him, then we are called to have NO blackout areas.  There is no room for short-circuits in our lives and the energy flow in our body.  We are to be totally free of any blockages which may lead to darkness having a place in our bodies.  We are to be holy (totally, not partially).

Holiness and sanctification go hand in hand.  We are told in 1 Corinthians 6:11 that we are washed, sanctified and justified.  “Sanctification occurs as a result of salvation. At the moment of conversion, the Holy Spirit enters our life. We are no longer held hostage by death, but are free to live the life God desires for us. We are thus sanctified simply because of our standing as lost souls saved by grace.”  So, once we are saved by the blood of Christ, (let’s think of that like getting a blood transfusion, replacing all of our old & decrepit blood with fresh, oxygen full blood!), we are to live a process of sanctification.

Why a process?  Unlike the things and places that are sanctified by God in the Bible, people have the capacity to sin. Even though we have been “set apart” as God’s children, we have free will and may continue to behave in ways that are contrary. As Christians, we realise shortly after we have been saved that there is a new inner battle being waged within us – a battle between our old sin-lead nature and new Spirit-lead nature.

So, while we got the blood-transfusion, there are still parts of the energy pathways in our lives that are blocked.  That have to be unblocked (and not re-blocked), so that the Spirit can flow through us.   And this is a constant process – we must continually clean out any blockages (confess sins), so that the energy of the Holy Spirit flows through us.

If I am angry with my neighbour, I have a blockage in my relationship with my neighbour.  Unfortunately, this same blockage that doesn’t allow me to speak openly with my neighbour exists in my body also – and so affects my relationship with God.  The blockage is in ME.  It’s not just in my relationship with my neighbour.  In some cases it goes as far as physically affecting my body.

I read about the following exercise: close your fist tight, and hold it tight until your knuckles go white (lack of blood & oxygen).  If you kept the flow of oxygen from your knuckles for long enough, they fingers would eventually die.  It’s medically been shown that something similar happens with anger and resentment… and how this affects some of our digestive organs.  When we are angry, one of the muscles that cramps up is in the abdomen (yeah… that “knot in your stomach”).  This muscle, if it cramps up too much and too often, forgets to relax… and then may cut off the proper blood supply to our stomach (resulting in ulcers), our lungs (means the muscles won’t inhale and exhale as they should, reducing the oxygen in all our body), or our heart (which may lead to heart attack).  And this is the just physical aspect!

And look what stress does to us:  When you perceive a threat, your nervous system responds by releasing a flood of stress hormones, including adrenaline and cortisol. These hormones rouse the body for emergency action.  We all know that your heart pounds faster, muscles tighten, blood pressure rises, breath quickens, and your senses become sharper. These physical changes increase your strength and stamina, speed your reaction time, and enhance your focus – preparing you to either fight or flee from the danger at hand.  The stress response is the body’s way of protecting you. When working properly, it helps you stay focused, energetic, and alert. In emergency situations, stress can save your life – giving you extra strength to defend yourself, for example, or spurring you to slam on the brakes to avoid an accident.  Unfortunately, the body can’t distinguish between physical and psychological threats. When you’re stressed over a busy schedule, an argument with a friend, a traffic jam, or a mountain of bills, your body reacts just as strongly as if you were facing a life-or-death situation.

Long-term exposure to stress can lead to serious health problems. Chronic stress disrupts nearly every system in your body. It can raise blood pressure, suppress the immune system, increase the risk of heart attack and stroke, contribute to infertility, and speed up the aging process. Long-term stress can even rewire the brain, leaving you more vulnerable to anxiety and depression.

How, then, am I sanctified? How do I become holy, because God is holy?

Well, if my body is a vessel through which energy flows, both my energy (Qi) and God’s energy, and I have blockages, then I cannot reach the level of holiness that my body (heart, soul & spirit) allows God’s energy to TOTALLY flow through me.  Sanctification is the process through which I let go of each blockage and remove it (confessing my sin, accepting God’s forgiveness, and then repenting – never repeating it, so as to never re-block that pathway), until such a point that the light of God completely flows through all of my being. Through the filling of the Holy Spirit, my energy and His energy combine, and I can do greater things.  I become a totally useful vessel, when I allow Him to flow through me, rather than wanting to do my own thing!  (No more singing, “I did it my way”).

One of Jesus’ parables teaches us that a farmer summarises whether or not a tree is good by its yield.  This isn’t the yield in one season or over 1 or 2 years.  This is the yield during the tree’s lifetime.  My works (actions) declare and manifest outwardly the reality of my faith which is not visible to man.  If I am bearing fruit, this shows that I am alive, healthy and productive.  My fruit is NOT what makes me alive.  It’s just the evidence that I am alive and well.  What makes me alive and well is the life ENERGY that flows through me!  And as I allow myself to be filled with God’s energy, and not just limited to my own, the results can be overwhelming!

If a man is to shed the light of the sun upon other men, he must first of all have it within himself.
If a man is to shed the light of the sun upon other men, he must first of all have it within himself.