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God - The Intimate Perspective

To some, God may seem like a lofty and abstract concept, but He is far nearer to us than we can fathom. “For in Him we live and move and have our being.” (Acts 17:28a, NIV) 
The Psalmist contemplates:

“You have searched me, Lord, 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, 
Lord, know it completely.
You hem me in behind and before,
and you lay your hand upon me.
Such knowledge is too wonderful for me,
 too lofty for me to attain...


“For you created my inmost being;
you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
your works are wonderful, I know that full well
My frame was not hidden from you
when I was made in the secret place,
when I was woven together in the depths of the earth.
Your eyes saw my unformed body;
all the days ordained for me were written in your book
before one of them came to be.
How precious to me are your thoughts, God!
How vast is the sum of them!
Were I to count them,
they would outnumber the grains of sand —
when I awake, I am still with you.”

(Psalm 139:1-6, 13-18, NIV)

God's very nature is Love. (1 John 4:8)  With loving hands and careful detail, God created us all in His image and likeness (Genesis 1:27).  The intimacy with which God knows us immeasurably surpasses any human relationship.  He perceives the thoughts of our hearts, the words on our lips, and every motion we make.  Consider for a moment how before you even existed on earth, God knew you and chose you before the foundation of the world! (Ephesians 1:4)  

That truth should be enough for us to love Him in return, but in His mercy and loving-kindness, God demonstrated the depth of His great love for us.  He came into human history as the man Jesus Christ to seek and to save us. He lived among us and experienced sorrow, suffering, and rejection.  He ultimately paid the price for our sin at the cross. Paul declared the ultimate expression of God’s love for us in his letter to the Romans: “But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” (Romans 5:8, NIV)  Jesus Himself expressed this truth: “Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.” (John 15:13, NIV)


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