[vc_row type=”in_container” full_screen_row_position=”middle” column_margin=”default” column_direction=”default” column_direction_tablet=”default” column_direction_phone=”default” scene_position=”center” text_color=”dark” text_align=”left” row_border_radius=”none” row_border_radius_applies=”bg” overflow=”visible” overlay_strength=”0.3″ gradient_direction=”left_to_right” shape_divider_position=”bottom” bg_image_animation=”none”][vc_column column_padding=”no-extra-padding” column_padding_tablet=”inherit” column_padding_phone=”inherit” column_padding_position=”all” column_element_spacing=”default” background_color_opacity=”1″ background_hover_color_opacity=”1″ column_shadow=”none” column_border_radius=”none” column_link_target=”_self” column_position=”default” gradient_direction=”left_to_right” overlay_strength=”0.3″ width=”1/1″ tablet_width_inherit=”default” tablet_text_alignment=”default” phone_text_alignment=”default” animation_type=”default” bg_image_animation=”none” border_type=”simple” column_border_width=”none” column_border_style=”solid”][vc_column_text]A.W. Tozer once said, “What comes into our minds when we think about God is the most important thing about us.”
But what if our circumstances have us so stuck that thinking about God seems just too hard? What if stopping to think about God seems like the job of people like pastors and missionaries and not us?
In this verse from Matthew, Jesus quotes the Old Testament in response to one of the Pharisee’s questions on the technicalities of resurrection:
Matthew 22:32
“‘I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.’ So he is the God of the living, not the dead.”
The Pharisees asked Him many questions, trying to pin Him down on the kinds of things they argued about. Instead of giving them the answer they were looking for, Jesus directed them to the One they were forgetting.
Jesus told them they were asking the wrong questions.
They weren’t thinking about the God of the living. They were thinking too small—zeroing in on details of death and resurrection. Jesus wanted to redirect their minds to God Himself.
When hope seems a long way off, or the details of our lives are all we can think about, Jesus invites us to think of the Living God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. The God of real people who had real problems and needed real hope. Not perfect people. Each of these people, along with their wives Sarah, Rebekah, Leah, and Rachel, had flaws. And yet, in time, each learned that the living God is a God of hope, the kind of hope that does not disappoint.
I’m inviting you into our newest series: From Hard to Hope. We’ll explore our Living God from the perspective of people in the Bible who learned that bouncing back is possible, that hope is more than available, and that bearing this hope into a broken world is not only God’s gift to us but essential for us to live out our purposes for others’ good.
If what we think about God says everything about us, then let’s think of God as our source of living hope, for our own good and others’ too.
Sow: What do you find yourself thinking about most?
Pray: God, will you help me think on you, the source of hope?[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]