Our God is Awesome

One of the benefits of the digital age is the ease of access platforms like YouTube provide. During my evening worship time with God, I remembered a song by Helen Baylor titled Awesome God. The first time I heard the song play was on the cassette player in my mum’s tiny Toyota. What struck me about the song were the mighty and frightful acts of God. The same God that poured out his judgment on Sodom and Gomorrah (Gen. 19) is the same God that sent His son to die for our sins (John 3:16). Reflecting on this I thought I’d ask the AI encyclopaedia (google) for the definition of awesome. It means “causing or inducing awe; inspiring an overwhelming feeling of reverence, admiration, or fear”.

This implies that God is not just about grace and provision, He is also a consuming fire (Deut. 4:24). As children of God, we must understand these aspects of God. The Bible gives us examples of people that have experienced His consuming fire and His grace. King David, the man after God’s own heart did. When Nathan rebuked David in II Sam. 12 (NIV), he told him about the judgment for his sins:

¹¹ “This is what the Lord says: ‘Out of your own household I am going to bring calamity on you. Before your very eyes I will take your wives and give them to one who is close to you, and he will sleep with your wives in broad daylight. ¹² You did it in secret, but I will do this thing in broad daylight before all Israel.’” ¹³ Then David said to Nathan, “I have sinned against the Lord.” Nathan replied, “The Lord has taken away your sin. You are not going to die. ¹⁴ But because by doing this you have shown utter contempt for the Lord, the son born to you will die.”

The awesomeness of God is shown by the fact that while He passed judgement on David, He also extended His mercy to him by sparing his life. Because David committed adultery and murder (II Sam. 11), not only did he lose his son, but his son Absalom also slept with his father’s concubines on the roof of the palace (II Sam. 16:22).

I’m not sharing this to make us afraid of God but for us to understand that our God is awesome and when we approach Him as the good father that He is (Is. 64:8, Luke 11:13 & 12:32), we should not forget to treat Him with reverence and fear (Ps. 112:1). That is one of the devices of the enemy, to make us get careless and forget ourselves by acting like God can be treated anyhow. David did and he paid dearly for it. Samson did, and he also paid dearly for it. Gal. 6:7-8 warns us that God cannot be mocked, and as His children, we must never forget that we will reap what we sow. God has provided us with His grace and mercy (Heb. 4:16, Ps. 136, Lam. 3:22-23, II Cor. 12:9) but we should never forget that He is also a consuming fire, and we must treat Him with reverence, admiration, and fear (Prov. 9:10). This is my charge to you. Our God is an awesome God!

Photo cred: Giles Creek Baptist Church

Dealing with Disappointment

In my home country, Nigeria, elections are ongoing to choose the next set of (servant) leaders that will oversee the country's governance for the next four years. For a lot of people, especially the youths, these elections were seen as a watershed moment in Nigeria’s history. However, as is the case with life, we do not always get what we want, which can result in disappointment. Considering how often we experience disappointment- some greater than others- how do we as children of God deal with disappointment? Not because disappointment is a sin but because our response to it is important.

While doing some research for this article, I stumbled upon one written in 2007 that made me realise that even in the bible, there were so many people that experienced disappointment. One such person was Elijah, the mighty prophet that appeared to Jesus on the mount (Matt. 17:3), the same one that won a great victory on Mount Carmel (I Kings 18:20-40) and ended the drought that had plagued Israel. For all his effort, he was rewarded by Jezebel with a death threat and all he could think of in the midst of his disappointment was for God to kill him (I Kings 19:2-4). Some disappointments in life are so great that all we want is to die.

David, the man after God’s heart (I Sam. 13:14, Acts 13:22), was another person that faced multiple disappointments. His life was one that had the highest of highs (the victory against Goliath, being anointed King) to the lowest of lows (Saul trying to kill him, his men wanting to stone him to death). Others like Sarah, Rebekah, Rachel, Hannah and Elizabeth waited for years for the fruit of the womb. Sarah even laughed when God told her she would have a child (Gen. 18:12-15) because she had gone way past the childbearing age and had completely given up.

When you are faced with disappointment, the best thing to do is to go into a mode of thanksgiving (I Thess. 5:18). Why? Because it is God’s will for you. When you give God thanks, you are displaying your faith and trust in God and showing the devil that he has no hold on you. No matter the disappointment, David always found a way to praise God. In Ps. 42, David kept talking about how discouraged he felt before deciding that he will praise God.

The act of giving thanks is so powerful that the devil tries to isolate you and keep you away from it. That was what happened to Elijah, he got so desperate that he was praying to God to kill him. Borrowing a line from Todd Galberth’s song: Fear is not my future, disappointment is not the end, neither is it your story. Every one of these people had an ending that was greater than their former (Rom. 8:28). Some of them (David, Sarah) were even named in the Heroes Hall of Faith (Heb. 11).

During the February Hallelujah Challenge, Pst. Nathaniel Bassey expatiated on what it meant to stand still. Standing still doesn’t mean not doing anything, it means praising God and warring in the spirit. The charge for you is that when you are dealing with disappointment, stand still! When you do so, you will see the deliverance the Lord will bring you (II Chr. 20:17). I believe and declare that the enemy you see today (disappointment) you will never see again in Jesus’ name (Ex. 14:13-14).

Photo cred: YouVersion