During times of strife, persecution, and seasons of great societal arrogance – when the voices of men and women that surround you in the media or in your culture are filled with every kind of arrogant, presumptive, false presupposition you can imagine – these are times when we must focus on the eternal glory of God.
And when I say focus, I mean take control of your thought life (or, more accurately, surrender control to the Spirit of Jesus).
And when I say God, I do not mean a general relativistic blob in the sky. I’m referring to Jehovah, the God of Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, and Jesus.
While listening to Tim Keller preach the other day, he explained the “pendulum” approach to focusing on the glory of God in your thought life.
Imagine two points on either side of a space. In the space (in the middle) there is a pendulum that swings to either point.
The point on the left, let’s imagine, is the incredible love of the Father: the tender, unfailing, unconditional love that strives to fellowship with us though unending grace, perfect us (through refinement of character) and redeem us when we stumble.
The point on the right is the eternal might and power of God that is fearsome and awesome just to ponder – a God of such eternal power that even the most terrifying hurricane, tornado, or impossibly high mountain peak is as nothing to Him – a God so holy and perfect that no one could possibly be “good enough” to earn their way into God’s favor.
The pendulum in the middle represents our mind. As we swing to the left and ponder the greatness of His love, it makes us thankful that He is also all-powerful. And then the pendulum swings fast to the other side as we ponder His awesome glory. But the more we ponder His eternal power and holiness, it can become overwhelming. Without His great love and grace, His awesome power and holiness would crush us. The pendulum then swings back to the subject of the Father’s love, and we’re even more thankful for His love. The more we think of His love, the more wonderful is His power – not only are we loved by God, but we are loved by the most powerful Being of all beings, therefore nothing can separate us from His love or stop His plans for the world and for us – and it swings back in that direction as we think about His power with gratitude. And as it swings back and forth, we become exponentially more thankful for both His love and His immense power. The two subjects in our mind feed off one another, and the thankfulness continues to expand in our hearts exponentially.
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