Becoming like God

At some point in our life, all of us find ourselves asking, or rather demanding the question, “God why would you allow this to happen?” “Why me?” “Why this?” or “Why NOT this?”

I am not attempting to answer the “Why” to those questions, that would be foolish and insensitive of me.

What I do believe though can give us a certain level of peace, is understanding, what God’s desire is for our lives. First off, we acknowledge that we were created to worship God and along that with that God is giving us a gift… if we allow him, he will change us. We will no longer look like ourselves, we will become like God.

We often here the verse quoted when someone is going through a difficult time, “And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose” (Romans 8:28). It has become the “chin up” verse, “everything will be fine, God is working things out for your good.” The devastating thing is that many of us believe we know exactly what is good for us. That’s what we pray for and ask for and think that we deserve.

What is God’s good for us though? That we pass through life with as little struggle as possible? That we be protected from what is evil and blessed with what is good? What happened to Jesus?

Jesus lived a perfectly obedient life and that obedience led him to a cross… And we are offered the same thing, "If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.” (Matt 16:24). (That’s a stipulation we might want to clarify next time we give an altar call!)

The second part of the verse in Romans gives us a whole new level of understanding.

“For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters.” (Romans 8:29).

Those who love God…..those who have been called according to his purpose….those he predestined……

THOSE people….he has decided to conform into the image of his Son.

So God’s GOOD for us is that we would become like his Son, Jesus. And what a priceless gift that is. What greater gift could we be offered by God then to become like God?

 Perhaps this is why Paul says in Romans we ought to “glory in our sufferings.”  Next time we pray for someone, or ourselves, who is struggling we should consider this. Don’t ask so quickly that that “thing” be added or taken away, because through that struggle comes God likeness. 

Love

Something I find quite intersting is the idea that loving someone means valuing someone; showing them they mean something. Love is a validation of a person's significance. You can understand pretty quickly what I'm talking about when you think back to a time when you shared some important information about your life with another person and that person didn't didn't pay attention to you, my guess is you probably didn't feel very special at that moment. What you wanted was for that person to listen intently and to affirm that what's happening in your life, to you, matters.

Love meaning valuing someone,  helps us to truely understand our hard emotions:

Anger, although it can show itself as outrage and sometimes violent, is a response to a LOSS of LOVE. It is a boundary violation where someone has done something to make you feel that you don't matter much.

Fear is a threat of rejection, it is a LOSS of LOVE that perpetuates itself into acts of hate to try to compensate for the sting of rejection. 

Sadness is a loss of control, also a loss of love. Those who have sadness are trying to recover or get back whats been taken from them

A few weeks ago the Christian philosopher, Peter Rollins came and spoke at our church and shared a wonderful analogy that gets at this idea...

What is significant about a child scoring a goal at their soccer game? Tt's not the mere fact that they scoared the goal that is significant, it's the fact that in the stands are the child's parents who witnessed this accomplishment. If no one saw the child score the goal, it wouldn't matter. Love brings value, meaning, purpose to things.  

Another way of looking at it,

When you are in a room you do not think of the light that is making the room visible, you are thinking about the things that you can see in the room because of the light. This is essentially what God does for us. God is the one who shines on us and gives us value & purpose. It is a humble love that does not seek to recognize itself but it illuminates the other. Our duty then ought to be to give recognition to who it is that truely gives us our value.

I could go on and on about all the connections that go with this but the main thing I want to emphasize is this:

God is love.... Because of what Christ did for us on the cross, out of love, we have all become valuable in God's eye's.

We don't owe Christ anything for this, but because of it, we are called children of God and in God's eyes we appear spotless like his son Jesus.

If we ever come to question our value or significance remember what Christ did for us... And when we choose to join Christ, what continues to make us significant is the fact that we are joined with him. He lives inside of us and infuses our lives with meaning and purpose. He is present in us,  illuminating us. Don't be fooled, this alone is what makes you valuable.