God is Great, God is Good

.....let us thank him for our food. Right? That's what usually comes to mind when we hear that phrase.

God is great and God is good.

It's so much more than just a cute way to teach little kids to be thankful for their food.

God is great and God is good.

I've been learning that these two essential truths can determine the way we live our lives out.

I'm reading a great new book called "Sun Stand Still" by Steven Furtick. It has once again challenged me to shift my focus back onto God and strive to live my life the way that he wants me to and to follow the path that he's planned for my life and our family's life.

Over the past two years, we've seen God show up really big--particularly through the adoption of our girls-- and slowly but surely, the fact that God is great and God is good has become more of a truth for us. Not that it hasn't always been true . It's just that we've finally started to hold onto that truth and put it into practice.

Before we went to Ethiopia for the first time, I have to say that we had a little faith in a little God (I say little God, not because of who God is, but because of the way we thought of him). We knew in our heads that God was way bigger than us, but our actions showed otherwise. We were living the safe life.

Having seen first hand a world so different than ours during our time in Ethiopia, we couldn't return home and go back to status quo anymore.

I decided then and there that I wanted my life here on earth to count for something. I was no longer content to be a "Christian" that shows up to church an hour or two on Sundays and then lives like there aren't starving and orphaned children all across the world and needy people all around us.

I want to be a world changer for Christ and I want to raise a whole army of kids for him.

Furtick says in his book, "What makes world-changing Christians unique, audacious, and powerful isn't their perfection (you can say that again-that's my comment, not his, but it bears saying because perfection is just something I'm not and it's sooooo good to know that we don't have to be perfect to follow Jesus with our whole hearts). What makes world changers unique is their understanding of God's perfect nature and purposes in the world." It's understanding that "this God is someone worth taking risks for."

He goes on to say that, "what you believe about God will directly determine the legacy of your faith and your impact on the world for the glory of God."

"Great people of faith simply get a grip on a handful of essential truths-and then they hold on to those truths for dear life as they follow Christ in faith, one step at a time."

I told you it was a great book.

So if we just need a few truths to hold onto, I think that God is great and God is good is a pretty good place to start.

If God is great, then we need to give him the opportunity to show it. One way the book says we can do this is by living "a life that can only be explained by the existence of a God who is infinitely great." "Knowing God is great enables you to dream, pray, and live beyond your means because you know he is ABLE to respond" (insert us homeschooling 6 kids and raising them up for the Lord-definitely a job bigger than me--glad I have a God that is able).

Along with his greatness, let us not forget that he is good and "God's goodness means that all his greatness is meant to work in ours lives for our good. Not necessarily our momentary happiness, but our ultimate good."

As we look back over our lives and our daily struggles, we must remember that God has been good to us. Just that fact that we are alive shows his goodness and while difficulties are sure to come, we can rest in the fact that God is with us to help, save and heal us.

I think that when we start to cling to the truth that God is great (able to accomplish anything in our lives) and God is good (always with us), it changes the way we think about "our" lives.

It inspires me to dream big, pray big and trust big.