What is your image of God? How do you ‘see’ God? How do you see His Character? How do you view His emotional makeup? What will He do? What will He ‘not’ do? How do you think God acts? Does God intervene in life? Is He distant, merely observing? Or is He close? Does God care? How deeply?
The way we see God governs all of our hopes and fears about existence. It is crucial that our picture of God corresponds with reality. We need to know who He really is rather than just making up, out of our own imagination, who we think He is.
The clearest picture of the invisible God, His heart, His mind, His emotions and His will, is found by closely examining the visible life of Jesus. Jesus came to earth to do many things. Clearly the destruction of the sin of the human race was a primary objective. However, equally, Jesus came to reveal exactly what the Father was like:
“If you have seen Me, you have seen the Father [God]” John 14:9
You may say, “Why was this such a primary objective for the Son of God while He existed in a human body?” Simply this… How can you even consider trusting God unless you know what He is like? How could you trust God with your life and it’s choices, your family, and ultimately your soul as you pass though death unless you absolutely KNOW that God is trustworthy?
Jesus makes INVISIBLE God VISIBLE! When you study the life of Jesus you find out how tender He was with the children, how fiercely He resisted evil religious leaders, what dignity He gave to women and how compassionate he was towards the sick and diseased! As you study His actions you begin to get a clearer picture of His Character. Knowing Jesus’ Character perfectly defines God’s Character you get a clearer picture of God character. There is a one to one correspondence.
Therefore this web site is dedicated to exploring the Character and Emotions of Jesus because they will show us clearly what is God’s Character and Emotions. Consider these following verses:
“When he [anyone] looks at Me, he sees the one who sent Me.” John 12:45
“The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of His being….” Hebrews 13:5
“He [Jesus] is the image of the invisible God….” Colossians 1:15
“… the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.” 2 Corinthians 2:4
“For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form….” Colossians 2:9
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Jesus revealed all of this because He was more than a human, more than a teacher of moral laws, more than a prophet… Jesus was the Jewish God who created nature, the earth and ultimately the Universe. And this God became a man… the long awaited Messiah that the Jewish people had been looking for during 2,000 years of history has appeared!
One of the interesting times where Jesus reveals His protection is in the interaction between Mary and Martha. Many are familiar with this event. Jesus comes and spends some time with Mary and Martha. Mary is fascinated with Jesus and quite frankly neglects some chores because she is completely absorbed with Jesus. Martha, understandably, gets upset! “Lord, […]
Let’s continue our theme to deeply internalize Jesus’ protection. Consider the time where Jesus eats dinner at Simon the Leper’s house with Lazarus, Mary and Martha. Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead sometime before this visit. (This visit is different from the one where Mary is sitting at Jesus’ feet while Martha is working.) In […]
This week let’s continue in our theme of Jesus’ protection. Think through the 4 Gospels and search for events in Jesus’ life where He protects someone. Cultivating this desire to come to the Word to search for Him causes our faith to burn brightly with joy and understanding. This habit of “looking for Jesus’ goodness” may […]
I would like to start the next mini-series on a character element of Jesus that I missed for the first 20 years of my Christian life. As you live life, pray and read your Bibles over the next couple months look for Jesus’ protection. Fascinatingly it starts showing up everywhere. And I find that it really […]
One more passage might be worth thinking about as we are considering Jesus’ desire. After Jesus eats the Passover meal with His disciples and friends, they all go out to Gethsemane. Jesus has most of the disciples (there were probably others besides the 12) sit while He went aside to pray. He does take Peter, […]
Luke 24:28 is a fascinating passage! Jesus has overcome death. And now He starts appearing to people. For various reasons He wants people to start knowing Him, not based on His physical appearance, but based on who He is! Two disciples are walking on the road going to Emmaus, which is about 7 miles from […]
Luke 13: 31-35 is a fascinating passage. Some Pharisees come to Jesus telling Him to run away because Herod wants to kill Him. Jesus likens Herod to a fox. Then He says something very interesting.
Luke 10:38 shows us an event where Jesus and His disciples were invited into Martha’s home. As Jesus is speaking Mary, the younger sister, sits at His feet and listens intently to everything He is saying. Martha is distracted from Jesus because she is concerned about all the preparations that need to be made for […]
Last week, we saw how Jesus strongly disciplined or corrected His followers for wanting to harm the Samaritan people. Today, let’s contrast Jesus’ discipline with His acceptance of the Thief on the Cross.
Consider the first entry. When Jesus cleanses the temple and drives out the money changers, the animanls and the entire system of extortion that was operating in the temple – you find out that the people are being protected from a money making system setup by the Pharisees and true worship of God is restored […]