Omni
means “all” and God is omnipotent, omnipresent, and
omniscient.
In other words, God is all powerful, all present, and all
knowing.
God
not only sees us, but sees into our hearts, and knows us better than we know ourselves. He knows why we say what we say, do what we
do, and go where we go. He knows every detail and thought and action of our
past, and our present. He also knows every detail, motive, thought and way that
we will take, and He still loves us. Psalm 33:13-15, tells us that from heaven the lord looks down and sees all mankind;
from His dwelling place He watches all who live on earth…He who forms the
hearts of all, who considers everything they do.
God watches
us and considers everything we do… this is something I need to
keep uppermost in my mind. God knows
that our minds can wander to places we should not go, that we sometimes have
thoughts we do not want to have, that we try fixing things ourselves before we
turn to Him, making our plans without His input, doing things the way we think
best without His perspective or direction, and feel wise in our own eyes. Then we find our plans did not go the way we
thought they would, we made a worse mess of the thing we were trying to fix,
and we feel lost, and maybe even hopeless.
We cannot see our way out of the mess we have gotten ourselves into and
have nowhere to turn. It is then we finally get around to calling
out to God, pleading with Him to please clean up our mess, or at least show us
how to get things fixed up.
First
of all, how did we get in the mess in the first place? Perhaps we were being wise
in our own eyes and did not inquire of God (through His Word), or request His
help through the Holy Spirit who is our Counselor. Why do we not always do this? If we think back in retrospect, we have 20/20
hindsight and remember when things turned out better than expected when we
trusted His wisdom and grace over our own. They may not have always gone
smoother, but the end result always came out better. How do we forget so easily?
God, alone, knows every detail about us from our actions and words, and our thoughts, before we even think them. And even to the deepest recesses of our inner being He knows what motivates us, why we do what we do, and think the way we do. He uncovers the secrets of our hearts and He, alone, knows what is best for us from an eternal perspective. He knows how our attitudes and ways affect everyone around us to some degree, whether for good or bad. He, alone, knows beforehand how the results of our own thinking and planning without His wisdom and direction will turn out. He is never surprised, but waiting for us to wake up and realize… we are not the managers of our life anymore, He is. Christ Jesus purchased us with His own blood, and we now belong to Him. He is our Master and we are His bondservants who are to be living for His will, not ours. Until we get this straight in our minds and hearts, we will continue to mess up, and when we do, like ripples in a pond after a stone is thrown in, our choices effect everyone involved in some way with our life.
After
we trust Jesus Christ with our salvation by faith in what Jesus accomplished
for us on the cross and through His shed blood, we belong to Him, and no longer
to our self. He gives us the indwelling of His Holy
Spirit, as our Counselor and Helper, and has given us His Word, the Bible, for
our knowledge of Him and our direction in life. Why? So we will know how to
work out in our lives what He has already put in. Our spiritual lives are lived progressively,
day by day, growing in grace and knowledge and filled with love for God and for
the brethren. Everything we do must be
done in love or it doesn’t count, and if we don’t love our brother, we need to
question the sincerity of our faith. If
anyone is concerned about this, ask God to change your heart to be like His
heart on that matter, and all matters. He wants our sincerity. Our sincerity is
proved in our heart desires, which God can see. Jesus wants us to honor Him in
all we do and say, and to have a loving, forgiving spirit toward all, including
our enemies, and to pray for them to come to know Jesus.
Sometimes,
I wonder why God puts up with me. I am a slow learner and forget at times what
I should remember. I am
not as obedient yet in all things, as I want to be, but am persevering day by
day to grow more in grace and knowledge of God and His mercy, grace, love, and
even His justice. I want to know Him,
His character and love in a deeper way, but I also need to learn to trust Him
in a deeper way, too. I do know that as I
learn to know His character and His ways better, my love and trust are actively
growing, even if slowly. I thank Jesus
for putting His perfect sinless life (His righteousness) to my account and for
paying the penalty for my sins because there is no way I could possibly, no
matter how hard I tried, or how much I wanted to be perfect,
attain it myself. Since there will be no
sin in heaven, the only way we get there is through Jesus Christ and His shed
blood and His sinless life. He paid our debt in full and when the Father looks
at His blood bought adopted children, He sees His Son’s righteousness covering
us. Hebrews 9:22
says “without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness.” That’s why only God could save us, and why He
became a man who lived a sinless life (the perfect Lamb without blemish), then
offer up that life as a sacrifice for all of us who would put our faith and
hope in Him and willingly exchange our old life for His life. How? By progressively
taking off our old grave clothes and progressively putting on Christ daily.
Biblical references to check out
Psalm 33:13-15
Hebrews 9:22
1 John 1:8,9
1 John 3:14
Romans 7:4-6
Romans 8 tells us how we are to rely on the help of the Holy Spirit who uses the Word of God to bring to our memory what we have been learning from it, and to give us direction through it. In this way we are no longer under the law, but rely on God's grace, as the Holy Spirit and the Word of God transform our thinking and direct our ways..
God watches over us and considers everything we do... and He wants us to remember and consider what His Son did for us... when we find it difficult to forgive from the heart and pray for those who hurt or even persecute us.
~Annie~
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