Inspector or Loving Father?

So when God asks you a question, do you hear invitation or accusation? The past few days I have been thinking about how easy it is to put a negative spin on the questions God asks me (or people in the Bible). For example, "Why are you afraid?" may sound to me like I am defective because I am instead of an invitation to trust Him when I am afraid (Psalm 56:3). And "Where is your faith?" may sound like an accusation about unbelief instead of an invitation to explore God's love and power in ways that increase my trust. You get the picture, I think.

I think that we tend to put a negative spin on what God says because we still very much need our "paradigms" adjusted in terms of who God is and what He is really like to those of us who are His children. Recently I reviewed some words by Andrew Murray, from With Christ in the School of Prayer, that helped me return to a healthier understand of who God really is. He is not our heavenly Inspector, He is our loving Father! See what you think.

We are afraid to take God as our tender Father. We think of Him as a schoolmaster or an inspector, who knows nothing about us except through our lessons... We aren't supposed to learn to be holy as a hard lesson at school so we can make God think well of us. We are to learn it at home with the Father to help us. God loves you not because you are clever or good, but because He is your Father. The cross of Christ does not make God love us. It is the outcome of His love to us. His love lies underneath everything. We must grasp it as the solid foundation of our religious life, not growing up into that love, but growing up out of it.

Meditate on the words “our Father.” Say them over to yourself until you feel something of their wonderful truth. They mean that I am bound to God by the closest and tenderest relationship, and that I have a right to His love, His power, and His blessing in a way no one else could give me... Imagine the boldness with which we can approach Him! It means that all His infinite love, patience, and wisdom reach down to help me. There is infinitely more implied by this relationship than the possibility of holiness.

We are to begin in the patient love of our Father. Think about how He knows us personally, as individuals with all our peculiarities, our weaknesses, and our difficulties. The master judges by the result, but our Father judges by the effort.

Don't you love that last line? But please don't read into it that God's first response to you is judgement! The point is that God as Father is always for us and not against, never looking for reason to condemn us but always looking for reasons to commend us. Will correction come? Yes, but if it comes it will bring hope and power to change because He is our loving Father, not the Heavenly Inspector!

Just reflecting on our loving Father...

Tom, one of His little children.