How Big Is Your God?
John Bertram Phillips was an English Bible scholar, author, and pastor who lived and ministered in and around London in the 20th century. He is most noted for his translation of the Scriptures, called The New Testament in Modern English (also known as the J.B. Phillips Translation).
During World War II, Phillips found that the young people in his church were having a hard time understanding the King James Version of the Bible. So during the blitz of London, when the Nazis bombed the city for weeks on end, Phillips used his time in the bomb shelters to begin translating the New Testament into more contemporary language. He began with the epistle to the Colossians and went on to translate all of the New Testament and several books of the Old Testament as well.
Phillips also wrote nearly forty books on Christianity until his death in 1982. It was a book he wrote in 1953 that was one of his most popular, and it always intrigued me, if only because of the title. It was called "Your God Is Too Small.” I will admit I have never read the book, but I did get the implied message from the title alone. And it brings up a good question that is usually answered by the way we live our lives “How big is our God?”
So, how big is your God? Big enough to handle the problems you face this week? Big enough to be trusted with the minute details of every day life? Big enough to do miraculous things, fit for a powerful and awesome Creator? Big enough to deserve submission because He is Lord?
Just check out your life, and you'll see how big you really think God is. It shows.
I heard a story about a little girl who, on the way home from church one Sunday, turned to her mother and said, "Mommy, my Sunday School teacher's lesson this morning confused me." "Oh. Why is that?" asked her mother. The girl replied, "Well, she said that God is bigger than we are. Is that true?" "Yes, that's true," replied the mother.
"She also said that God lives within us. Is that true?" Again the mother replied, "Yes." "Well," said the little girl, "if God is bigger than us, and He lives in us, wouldn't He show through?"
The obvious truth is, God does show through our lives when we allow Him to be "bigger than us" and to "live in us" in all that we do. The problem occurs when we think we are bigger than God and try to run our own lives--and He lets us. Not only do we experience the frustrations of our own self-sufficiency, but we also hinder people around us from seeing our big God who lives within us.
My prayer for each of you this week is that God would be HUGE in your life, and that all those around you would see Him show through. I look forward to seeing you this Sunday, as we worship our awesome God together..
--Pastor Ken
