Day 1

Our knowledge of God affects everything in our lives – our relationship with Him, and His relationship with us. You see, how we perceive Him has a lot to do with how we receive and believe in Him. A lot of people enlist a lot of words to describe who and what God is. Words like merciful, righteous, just, holy, all-powerful, among a few, and every one of them is true. However, the question does not lie within the words we ascribe to Him, but what our life reveals when the going is tough, when our way is rough, about Him. Talk is cheap, isn’t it? It has been said that adversity is the revelation of all of us in what we believe.

A.W. Tozer, in his book, *The Knowledge of the Holy*, wrote, “What comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us.” Tozer understood that such mindfulness, our understanding of God, affects everything we do. “Where it is inadequate or out of plumb the whole structure must sooner or later collapse.” The late Bill Bright, founder of Campus Crusade for Christ, agreed: “Everything about our lives – our attitudes, motives, desires, actions, and even our words – are influenced by our view of God.”

You see, the career we choose, who we will ultimately marry, the friends we make, - what and how we value, are all based on our understanding of what and who God is.

When we read of God’s chosen people, the Israelites, we see how a wrong perception gets lived out firsthand. After all the years of living in Egyptian captivity, 400 to be exact, God delivers them. In their journey to a land God had promised (don’t miss that), God parts the Red Sea, provides them protection, a cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night, and all the daily rations necessary, literally raining it from the sky (that alone says a lot). However, when they needed water they cried out to Moses, *“Why did you bring us up out of Egypt to make us and our children and livestock die of thirst?”* (Exodus 17:3).

Time after time, again and again, they failed to trust in God’s goodness because of their immediate understanding of Him. Their misconception kept leading them to earthly pursuits rather than embracing their heavenly rewards. “Idolatry of heart assumes that God is other than He is and substitutes for the true God one made after its own likeness,” says Tozer.

You see, when we do not view God correctly, we will continue to risk worshipping Him not as He is, but as whom we have created Him to be, and that is never good. We may not get as creative as the Israelites did in the desert, fabricating a cow out of gold; but maybe worse, we quietly build more subtle ones, idols that are not easily detected, but just as lethal in the end.

Listen, God wants us to have a rightful understanding of who He is, and what He does, because it does affect everything in our lives. *“Let the one who boasts boast about this: that they have the understanding to know Me, that I am the LORD, who exercises kindness, justice and righteousness on earth, for in these I delight”* (Jeremiah 9:24).

**QUESTIONS FOR REFLECTION**

1. What comes to your mind when you think of God?

2. In what ways are you trusting in God for His goodness? If not, are you viewing God correctly, or have you created a “cow out of gold”?

3. What can you do today to ensure your view of God is as it should be to carry you through your day?

*God, rid me of false perceptions of You, and help me to see You as You truly are. May I then be a reflection of You. Amen.*