How much time does the average Christian spend revering our Creator, the Lord God almighty? I know that we do it when we go to church on Sundays but how often do we do it in our homes or at our jobs or even in the car driving to what ever destination we seek? When we do take the opportunity, how long do we spend in reverence to our Lord? Is it just a couple of minutes at the start of prayer so we will not seem greedy by jumping straight away to the petitions? Do we really think that we are fooling God?

I try to revere the Lord at the start of every prayer. Sometimes my prayers contain nothing but honoring and worshipping God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit. It seems that I have so much to be thankful for that I just can not bring myself to ask him for anything for myself other than forgiveness of my sins. God is wholly good and deserves all the recognition and love we can offer him. He forgives us for our sins though we are unworthy of that forgiveness. He blesses our lives ignoring the fact that we are sinful by nature and as long as we live on this world we will harbor sin at our core. He knows this and embraces us with His love anyways. “But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us” Romans 5:8.

Can you imagine sending one of your loved ones to die for someone who constantly defies you and holds you in contempt and may even refuse to recognize your existence? God did just that for us because He loves us and He wants to restore the relationship that He had with man in the Garden of Eden. He seeks to give us that which we could not obtain on our own, the righteousness that comes from faith in the sacrifice and resurrection of Jesus Christ our Savior. What an amazing and generous thing that our Creator has done for us. He holds out His hand grasping our salvation and even though some slap it away, others reach out to humbly accept what the Lord is offering. Praise be to Jesus the Savior of the world.

I find it most saddening that some will never know the goodness and love that God offers to us. Some just can not accept that love because by doing so they would have to face the fact that there are things bigger and more important than they are and that they do not control their own existence. What a blow to the prideful to face the truth that someone else is running the show that they call their lives. What can not be accepted, however, will be denied regardless of the facts that lay before them. It seems the illusion of self autonomy is preferable to the freedom offered by recognizing who you live for and who you serve. It is an illusion for the prideful to believe that they are not the slave of another. They are slaves to their vices or their ego or to material things. We are all slaves to something but only those who realize this and break the yoke of sin and accept the yoke of Jesus can truly know freedom. And though the prideful may be slaves to their sinful nature all things, in the end, serve the Lord.

So, recognizing that the Lord has freed me from my sinful state, I take upon myself servitude to the Lord Jesus Christ and I give Him thanks and praise for all that he has done for the world, believers and me. Sometimes my prayers can be summed up as nothing more than “I love you God” because I do love the Lord with all my heart and soul. How often do we just tell God that we love Him? Lately I find myself saying it all through the day. I have yet to find a place that is so hectic and distracting that I could not bow my head or look up to the sky and say “I love you Lord.” When time allows I say much more.

In my quiet moments I speak to God words of praise and delight. The Father has no need for such words but it does please Him to hear them and they are a joy for me to say. How much thanks and praise can I give the one who freed me from my sins and forgave me for all my discordant behavior and have it be enough? I could praise and honor Him for all eternity and it still will not come close to making good on the debt for which He has put behind Him. I recall the words Jesus when told Simon the Pharisee about loving much for being forgiven much (Luke 7:36-50) and I realize just how much the Lord God has forgiven me and I know just how much I love Him for His sacrifice upon the cross.

When things get busy and there seems little time for prayer and honoring our Lord, just envision Christ upon the cross at Golgotha and mediate upon the reasons that He is dying there. The daily grind of the world will seem a little less important. When one truly understands the depths that he or she has been forgiven, reverence of the Father becomes an easier thing to do. Just look around and see the beauty of his creation. Just look at this world and see his handy work. Get some pictures taken by the Hubble Space Telescope and gaze at the Master Artist’s cosmic master piece. Michelangelo’s canvas was the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel but God’s canvas is the heavens above us and the earth below our feet.

Look on these glorious signs of a creative and loving God and remember that God’s Word brought them in to being. And while he was busy creating all these majestic wonders in the heavens and earth he took the time to create such little things as you and me. Though we are little things in the eyes of God and other men, He thinks so much of us that he has offered us eternity as a gift and time out of time to be in His blissful presence. As an act of gratitude, the least we should do is to return to him one of the gifts He has given us… eternal love.