Victoria Advocate, A Different Perspective
Time to eat humble pie. Serve me up a big slice. In my last column, a reader kindly pointed out something that made him curious. Well, it should have…I wrote “God is the highest created being.” Oops! Actually, it was worse than a mere oops. Loosely speaking, it was heresy—an expressed religious opinion contrary to church doctrine.
And it was completely unintentional. As best I can figure, my brain was thinking two very separate thoughts, and my fingers typed the thoughts together. It had to be something weird like that because I don’t believe that God is a created being. He is the Creator. Jesus, who is God-incarnate, said, “I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end.” (Revelation 22:13, NAS) God is eternal. There was nothing before him and nothing comes after him. He’s higher than us in every sense of the word, worthy of our worship and praise.
So for anyone who was surprised or offended at that statement, I’m sorry. It wasn’t a reflection of what I believe. Plain and simple, it was an error and an oversight since I didn’t catch it during the editing process either.
But let’s move on to better things than my mistakes. For those of you who love to read about grandchildren antics, I’ve got some good ones.
Let’s see… my daughter and her family were at Chick fil a when three young men walked in, two of them wearing cowboy hats. Our four-year-old granddaughter approached them—she might have been encouraged by my daughter—and asked where their horses were. Then she asked if they had unicorns. By all accounts, the young men listened carefully and seemed delighted by her questions.
The same granddaughter disappeared with a bag of trail mix the last time I visited. I had purchased it at Buc-ee’s and made a small pile for each granddaughter on the table. When Ellie fussed that her pile didn’t have an M&M, I added one. Later, we found the empty bag behind a chair with the rest of the nuts and raisins scattered on the floor but no candy. Obviously, my offering of one small M&M wasn’t enough.
On a different note, during the last cold snap, my husband found a lizard outside. Poor guy was numbed by the cold. He brought it in, and since he was headed to my daughter’s, I encouraged him to take it. Annabelle, our oldest granddaughter, loves lizards. Well, she was pleased as punch about having a new pet, until the lizard escaped a few times, and it was her job to catch it. Then she decided “outside” was its real home. They all congratulated her mature decision, since she used to have a collection of in-house lizards. It’s taken a couple of years, but her parent’s patience has paid off. Not without plenty of tears and drama in the meantime.
God is patient with us too. Patient with our tears and drama. And all of our “not fair” rants. The disciple John often addressed his human flock as “little children.” It’s meant as an affectionate term rather than demeaning. Forever and always, we’re God’s children—beloved and accepted in his eyes. He’s already made provision through the sacrifice of Jesus for anything we do wrong, intentional or otherwise. I John 1:9 says, “If we confess our sin, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”
If our heart is turned toward our Creator instead of stubbornly attempting life on our own terms, it doesn’t matter how often we get it wrong. He’ll help us pick up the pieces and turn us in the right direction again.
Just because he loves us.