As always – feel free to comment/discuss:

There is an old saying – which cam to mind while discussing yesterday’s devotion on the Trinity.  A good friend of mine indicated that he feared reducing his faith to that of the country/gospel songs where Jesus is described as a friend/pal – almost as if he will raise a mug of Coors or Bud with us.  ( blech) .  I get that, there is a point where we can make God our ole bud and then take him for granted.  (as we sometimes do with our best friends)

It’s what the old phrase “familiarity breeds contempt” so aptly describes.   THe idea that the longer we spend with someone, or with something, the more we take it for granted.

We have to admit – most of us take God for granted, and treat Him contemptuously from time to time.  🙁

I wonder though, is our taking Him for granted just based in our being too close? That we only take Him for granted when we think of Him as friend as a familiar part of our lives?  Or do we take Him for granted when we think we related to Him as the Creator, and we are just a speck of the Creation?  I would suggest its both.

So let’s look again at a familiar passage..

^15:11 “I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. ¹² My commandment is this: love one another, just as I love you. ¹³ The greatest love you can have for your friends is to give your life for them. ¹⁴ And you are my friends if you do what I command you. ¹⁵ I do not call you servants any longer, because servants do not know what their master is doing. Instead, I call you friends, because I have told you everything I heard from my Father. ¹⁶ You did not choose me; I chose you and appointed you to go and bear much fruit, the kind of fruit that endures. And so the Father will give you whatever you ask of him in my name. ¹⁷ This, then, is what I command you: love one another.
John 15:11-17 (TEV) 

It is in realizing that Jesus, Lord of Lords, King of Kings shares with us what the Father entrusted Him with, that we are no co-heirs of Christ, adopted children of God.  That level of familiarity, that yes, does include the entire Trinity, that is amazing!  A common sinner like me (and yes you as well) welcome into the presence of God, not as a servant/slave, as one indebted (yet we owed a great debt) but as family, is too me something I desire not to take for granted, not to treat contemptuously, and yes, it hurts and sickens me when I realize that I have.  How it should crush us, for a moment, as we realize that we have forgotten the Holy Spirit, who abides with us, the incredible gift of our baptism.

We are His people,….I am His own.  He has called us by name – His name….

He became common – that He could be with us… that we would share in His glory, as we abide in Him, and He abides in us…

May this familiarity continue to breed such awe..that my life responds in worship and praise!