You Can Relate

     Thanks for joining me on the side streets, Bad Friday and The Rolling Stones.  Had to take a detour to focus on resurrection weekend.  I hope all of you had a great Easter and once again were reminded that the resurrection power was not a one time event, but the fuel that drives us today.
     Back to our journey of discovery what we believe about God.  While we are on the entrance ramp, let's review what we have seen so far.  We want to notice things that we don't often mention when we are talking about God's attributes.  His power is certainly evident in the creation story, but we wanted to highlight His apparent delight in the creative process.  Being creative is a part of His nature that didn't end after seven days.  God has placed that creative quality in all of us.  He loves to be creative with us.  Just as he pulled Adam into the creative process by asking him to name all the animals and tend to the Garden, He still looks for us to be creative about His business today.  Creativity is the earmark of many churches and ministries that are impacting our world today.  Most people have more creativity inside of them than they ever realized.  As a whole, we are not encouraged to use it because our jobs don't  required it and in most cases it would interfere with the job.  We have substituted excellence for creativity.  We keep getting better at what we do, but we keep doing the same thing.  Your boss might not like your creativity, but God loves it and smiles every time you use it.  You were created in His image and He is creative.
     Not only did we see His creative pleasure and abilities, but we saw how relational God was.  So far we see that God does very little that does not involve relationship.  From the plurality involved in creation to the relationship with Adam and Eve and God in the Garden to Noah and the Ark, it was all about relationship.  God has never been preoccupied with the obedience to the letter of the law, rather, He is interested in how it all shakes down relationally.  Everything He created, every law He wrote was to define and enhance relationships.  That was a huge distinction for me to discover.
     He is all knowing, all powerful, all wise, ever present, and whatever superlative you can think of, but those qualities gain their maximum meaning when they are fleshed out in relationships.  What good are these qualities if they don't relate to man.  It is all about relationship.  What was the first thing Satan attacked?  How they related to God.  When we properly understand these superlatives, we understand relationship.  God is God and He deliberately chooses to interject all of His attributes into His relationship with us.  That is pretty awesome.  JOIN THE JOURNEY and experience God in a the most incredible relationship imaginable.