Come

Sunday morning my family was spending time together as the church in our home.  It wasn’t our first attempt to do this, but lest you imagine that we have a long-standing tradition of experiencing the manifest glory in our living room, let me make clear that we are taking baby steps here.  I hope that someday it will be something like that, but in the meantime, I’m just incredibly grateful for where we are. 

As we waited for the Lord to speak, I began to thank Him in my heart for the fact that He says to us, “Come.”  A few minutes later, I was sharing this with the rest of the family and this truth just blossomed in front of us.  In Isaiah 1:18 … God says, “Come let us reason, though your sins be as scarlet, I will make them white as snow.  In Matthew 11:28 Jesus said, “Come all you who are weary and carry heavy burdens and I will give you rest.”  The author of Hebrews encourages us to “Come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.” (Hebrews 4:16) 

Growing up in American culture has shaped my thoughts about God and not always for the best.  I realized this morning as we began to see this wonderful truth of God with His arms open and extended in loving invitation, that my default imagining of God was nothing like that.  In fact, the picture that came to mind was more like that of Dorothy and her friends coming before the Great and Terrible Wizard of Oz:  fearful trembling before an angry powerful One Who demands performance before there can be acceptance or assistance.  This is the essence of most religions in the world.  And yet, if we flush all the lies the world and its belief systems have told us and focus on the truth revealed by the written Word and the Living Word, what a wonderfully different scene we see.  We see the Father running to embrace the prodigal.  We see Jesus coming into the world as one of us, to defeat the enemy none of us could overcome, even though it took Him all the way to a painful, shameful death.  We see Jesus making breakfast on the beach for one who denied Him and saying, “Come have something to eat.”  God is good.  He is so much better than we give Him credit for.  He loves us, and He says, “Come.”

Thank You, thank You  Lord for being a God who says, “Come.”