Who is God? He Tell Us What to Leave Behind

Genesis 12:1 -
"Now the Lord said to Abram, “Go from your country and your kindred and your father's house to the land that I will show you."

Who is God?
He tells us what we need to leave behind in order to follow Him. 
As we lose sight of what we love the most, we find Him. 
He invites us to begin a journey without knowing where we are going. 
He bestows blessing and greatness so that we become a blessing.
He establishes a people that will mediate divine blessing to all the families of the earth.
He responds to obedience with further revelation.  
He calls us to build places of worship.
His purposes are greater than our doubt or deception. 

Prayer:
Father, it is my great honor to follow You into the unknown.  I trust you.  You are beyond any country, kindred, or house, that I leave behind.  Hear my cry to be blessed, and to be a blessing.   Show me any area of disobedience that is hindering me along the way.  May I look back at a life of building places of worship.   Oh that it would be said of me, that I went "as the Lord had told him."

Who is God? He Resists Making Name for Ourselves

Genesis 11:4 - 
Then they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be dispersed over the face of the whole earth.”

Who is God?   
He resists our efforts to build a name for ourselves.  
He confuses those who oppose Him.  
Because He desires His people and His glory to cover the earth, He disperses us.  

Prayer:
Father, you know my tendency to stay in one place, with one people and build my stairway to heaven.  But Oh God, you have not called me to one place or one people.  You have called me to proclaim your glory to the nations. May you be pleased when you "come down to see" my life.

Who is God? He Thunders "Never Again!"

Who is God?
His blessing is the invitation to be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth. 
He is the giver of life.
He made us in his image and requires a reckoning for those who come against our life. 
As the waters recede, He draws His bow across the sky and thunders "never again!"  
His covenant reminders can be painful or beautiful, but they are always true.  
He invites us to look up and see the beauty of His covenant promise. 

Genesis 9:16 - Whenever the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and all living creatures of every kind on the earth.” 

Prayer:
Oh Father, you have given everything to me.  Make my life fruitful oh God.  Allow the work of my hands to touch the ends of the earth.  I look up in wonder at your bow in the clouds, knowing that you are remembering.  You are covenant.  You are everlasting. You are good!

Who is God? He seals our redemption

Who is God?
In the midst of destruction, 
He remembers, and breaths redemption upon the earth.  
When it is time for judgement to recede, 
He closes the windows and restrains the rain.
When the rescued ones worship, 
it is a pleasing aroma to Him;
He seals their redemption. 

Genesis 8:1, 2, 20, 21:
“But God remembered Noah and all the beasts and all the livestock that were with him in the ark. And God made a wind blow over the earth, and the waters subsided. The fountains of the deep and the windows of the heavens were closed, the rain from the heavens was restrained...  Then Noah built an altar to the Lord and took some of every clean animal and some of every clean bird and offered burnt offerings on the altar. And when the Lord smelled the pleasing aroma, the Lord said in his heart, ‘I will never again curse the ground because of man, for the intention of man's heart is evil from his youth. Neither will I ever again strike down every living creature as I have done.’”

Prayer:
Father, I am carried by your redemption and mercy. 
Your breath Oh God restrains destruction. 
So I rest in your care. 
I hear the sounds of storms and loss all around me. 
I treasure this place of covering. 
But I treasure you most of all.
I bring you my offering of worship 
and ask that you make my life fruitful 
and a pleasing aroma to you.
Amen.

Who is God? He invites us to build place of redemption

Who is God?
He sees wickedness, and the thoughts and intentions that fuel it. 
His response to great wickedness is to grieve and even regret His own creation. 
In His sorrow, He blots out life that refuses to honor him.
He extends favor to the one who is righteous, blameless and walks with Him.
His sight determines the standard of what is corrupt. 
His response to unrelenting corruption and violence, is to "determine," and "destroy." 
He invites us to build a place of redemption in the midst of judgement.  
If we agree to His plan of salvation, he invites us in, and establishes covenant with us.   

Genesis 6:5-14
The Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. And the Lord regretted that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him to his heart. So the Lord said, “I will blot out man whom I have created from the face of the land, man and animals and creeping things and birds of the heavens, for I am sorry that I have made them.” But Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord. ...Now the earth was corrupt in God's sight, and the earth was filled with violence. And God saw the earth, and behold, it was corrupt, for all flesh had corrupted their way on the earth. And God said to Noah, “I have determined to make an end of all flesh, for the earth is filled with violence through them. Behold, I will destroy them with the earth. Make yourself an ark of gopher wood. Make rooms in the ark, and cover it inside and out with pitch.
 

Prayer:
Father, reading your word is heartbreaking because I see my heart in it. Forgive me for any way that I bring your grief and regret.  You have every right to blot out my life and to say, "I have determined. I will destroy."

Yet you offer redemption instead of judgment. 

So I run to you. Only in you do I find favor, covenant and salvation. Allow me to come in. Your son is righteous and blameless and has made a way for my salvation.

Amen.