Day 42
Exodus 32:1‐33:23; Matthew 26:69‐27:14; Psalm 33:1‐11; Proverbs 8:33‐36
God in a Box
I read a book many years ago (Sorry, can’t remember the name of it…) that talked about how so many of us try to put God in a box. We imagine God to be of the size and shape we need. Further, we tend to put God away in this box when we want to act in some way other than the way God would have us. God is bigger than any box we could ever construct.
Even though God’s people in today’s Old Testament passage had seen the invisible God in action, they still wanted the familiar gods they could see and shape into whatever image they desired. They had seen Him act in the plagues, in the crossing of the Red Sea, and in the provision of the manna and the quail – but it was not enough.
We are so much like them. Our great temptation is still to shape God into a picture we can imagine, to make God convenient to follow or to pay no attention. God responds in great anger when His mercy is ignored. The gods we create turn us away from the care our loving God wants to shower on us. God can’t work in us when we put anyone or anything above Him. What false gods in your life are preventing the true God from living in you?
The Rev. Phyllis Bartle