Tuesday, January 25, 2011

Celebrity Deity


A question I have been asking myself recently is, “what is it that I am dying to see from God?”  I ask this because it points me to a deeper question, is what I am dying to see of God, something that is God or something I have made up about God.  I have seen numerous people longing to meet, date, and marry some celebrity because they are so attractive.  The thought process behind this is basically that the celebrity is so attractive that if you met and fell in love with them, all would be perfect with the world.  The truth is that celebrity is human, and as we see so often in Hollywood, all is not perfect in the world.  In fact, not much seems right with the world at all if that is your logic.

Is God some celebrity to us? 

Do we fantasize about Him, who He really is, what He “can do for us?” 

Do we believe the truth, and not just in word, but do our actions depict the truth that we say we believe?

Maybe it is just me, but I continually find myself with answers (when I am really honest with myself) that I need to reevaluate.  What am I dying to see of God?  I want to see Him, for who He is, the truth of who He is and if that blows my mind and shakes the core of all that I know…so be it.  I want to understand the true Him deeper than any other person, and I am serious when I say that.  I am not trying to outdo anyone; I just want to experience God in the greatest way possible, and whatever that looks like.  I don’t want to fantasize who God is because that is unnecessary.  How can we make more of God?  We seem to want to glam Him up somehow when it is completely unnecessary, just get to know Him honestly and what we will find will be greater than any fantasy we can conjure up.

Does God promise us earthly wealth?  No, but that is just temporary anyway.

Does God promise us health?  No, again, as hard as that is to grasp in our finiteness, that is temporary.

Is God a genie that answers our wishes?  No, and to think so is demeaning of God and fantasizing Him into a weaker form than He is.

What am I dying to see of God?  I want to see Him.  I don’t even know how to word what I want to see of God, I just want Him.  Like a child can’t necessarily explain the comfort they feel from a mothers nurturing when they need consoled or a father’s strong arm picking them up when they fall and scrape their knee…that is how I feel.

I just want my Father. 

That is all I want.  I don’t want anything else, nothing more (as if there were more) nothing less (what often happens if we try to make Him more).  When He doesn’t meet my prayer request as I think it should have been, I want to know (and the only reason I ever doubt that is because of my shortcoming) that the reason is because He knows better.   I can’t put it all into words, but that is the closest I think I can get to explain what it is that I am dying for from God.  I just want Him, to feel His presence (that I know is there even when I don’t feel it), I just want to hear more from Him, experience Him more, know Him more, spend more time with Him…and by Him, I mean the true Him and not the conjured up fantasy of Him. 

Christ battled this same thing throughout His time here.  Many expected one thing of the Messiah, but He was more than their fantasies, and did much greater things than what the people of that time could imagine.  We fall into the same trap they do, but just like them, we don't see it that way.  May we all live to know Him more, and hunger for more of Him in our lives.

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