Understanding the Importance of the Order of Things | Part Eight
We are talking about perspective and, in particular, trying to ensure the correct order of things.
As we learn more about the Trinitarian God our expression of love and adoration similarly grows. If I see the Fatherhood of God and His love more clearly, the grace of Christ and His sacrifice more fully and the fellowship and wisdom of the Holy Spirit more abundantly, the strength of my response also grows. This continual growth in understanding the love and wonder of God overflows into our human relationships.
The truth that we are redeemed, and daily sustained, by the grace and mercy of God causes our hearts to swell with gratitude and praise.
Geoff Bullock was one of the founders of Hillsong. He was a prolific songwriter; many of his songs became internationally famous. He knew the pleasures of stardom but God’s plan was for him to realise the depths of his own sinful nature and to know that the only cure comes through the grace of God.
Many observers would have judged Hillsong 95 as the pinnacle of Geoff Bullock’s music; but for him it was the worst experience of his whole ministry career.
“I felt so out of my depth. I kept thinking, ‘I don’t know what I’m doing here, I’m unable to be the person that I am pretending to be.’”
Geoff’s life imploded, he was diagnosed with bipolar issues, his marriage collapsed, his confidence evaporated. “…my brokenness was overwhelming.”1
But God was purposefully at work:
“In my brokenness Jesus met with me. It wasn’t so much me walking with Him, but rather Him walking with me. I didn’t hold Him, He held on to me. I wasn’t faithful, He was faithful. I had nothing to offer, He had everything to offer… People say I fell from grace. I didn’t fall from grace; I fell into it”2
He then began to revisit his songs and to re-write them from his newly found perspective. Probably his most famous song was The Power of Your Love. The first couple of lines of the original and the re-write are below. His re-focus was to move from the centrality of people to the centrality of God. His eyes had been opened to the truth of seeing that, “it is all of God”
The Power of Your Love
Original Version: Lord, I come to You Let my heart be changed, renewed, flowing from the grace that I’ve found in You
Rewrite Version: Lord, You come to me, and as my heart is changed, released, this miracle of grace gently sets me free
Blessings
Brian
Have there been times in your life where you have realised that you have a wrong perspective on God and have needed to change?
Are there perspectives of God held by our young people that need to change?
[1] Christianity Today January 2003
[2] CT 2003