GodReflection: What Make God Smile?

God is the Eternal Paradox. My little human brain cannot wrap itself around the contrast poles of God’s love for His created ones and His DNA of justice. On the one hand He loves eternally AND on the other hand, with the gavel of justice He will sentence those who refused His love to eternal damnation.

The Great Awakening of the eighteen-century spawned men like the Puritan Jonathan Edward’s who reverberated the sentiments of the period through his famed sermon Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God. Similar sermons rang out from the eighteen-century down to the 20th-century that encompassed the first five decades of my life.

Since the human pendulum seemingly never stops in the middle it is probably safe to say that at times the God of Judgement has received more press coverage than the God of Love.

Yes, I know God with His infinite wisdom will bring every last person that ever walked upon earth to final judgement. However, because of the trust I’ve placed in Jesus my place in God’s eternal home is secure.

Over the next few posts I want to explore the soft tenderness of Creator God. The God who wants me to call Him, Father. The God who understands my humanness. The God who loves me. I want to circle around the concept of what makes God smile?

Jesus, who reflected God’s image shows me the tender side of Father God. In the Jesus who called the children and walked with disenfranchised women and men I see God’s smile.

When I read Luke’s summation, Jesus grew in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and man, I hear Luke’s affirmation that people liked Jesus. As I go through the Gospels I cannot help but envision times when Jesus smiles—sometimes in exasperation and other times as he extends a hand in care.

Jesus must have smiled in a big way as he walked on the water and reached for the sinking disciple Peter. In the Lord’s question, “why did you doubt?”, I see a smile that encompassed understanding. Jesus was not caught by surprise. In loving relationship both Jesus and Peter were ready to move forward to the next lesson.

Surely Jesus smiled with compassion as he laid out the hope of living water to a woman with the riddle, everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst.

As I begin these post in an attempt to draw on the nature of a Holy God as Father I plan to circle around various scenarios that must bring a holy smile to His face.

I invite you to join with me and provide your own input as together we explore the image of the tender side of the Creator.

Stay tuned.

Dr. Gary J. Sorrells
A GodReflection on What Makes God Smile

Gary@Godreflection.org
http://www.GodReflection.org
http://www.MakeYourVisionGoViral.com