Chap #1 – Getting Started Right

News reporters are driven to frame their research with the Who, What, When, Where, How, and Why of the event. You and I often do the same thing. But when it comes to God's fingers in the affairs of men, in a heartbeat we begin skating on thin ice – why? There's the reason; we start our deepest felt questions about God with the wrong reporter word; WHY.

“Why did God put sin in our world, since He hates it?”

In this beginning chapter 'getting started right' we should state a simple definition of the word SIN, as follows:

Sin is thinking or doing things we KNOW God doesn't like.

With our feeble earthly minds, we are wise to set the standard for our vision of the why of things, particularly where God Almighty is concerned. It's the word Almighty we struggle with. It is a daily task to have the firm mindset that God is the 'Almighty'. Judgment is by Him toward us, never by us judging Him. He answers to no one, for His actions and authority. He is the ultimate in authority, with no close seconds. i.e. there is no one or nothing we can compare Him to. Daniel, in the Old Testament, was inspired to say it this way:

And all the inhabitants of the earth are reputed as nothing: and He doeth according to His will in the army of heaven, and among the inhabitants of the earth: and none can stay His hand, or say unto Him, What doest thou? Daniel 4:35.

In this short journey toward learning more about our awesome sovereign God, we'll begin by visualizing two bookends facing each other. The left one we'll call “Eternity Past”, and the right one “Eternity Future.” The attribute that is common to all the objects in our gifts and bookends illustration is, FELLOWSHIP: cooperation with purpose.

His gifts to us, far more often, than not, come to us as PACKAGES - not those in a box with a ribbon. [~]