What is your perception of God?

What is your perception of God? Or Jesus?  Since we tend to build our spiritual lives around our perception of God, it is important to know what that perception is!

In the last post I wrote about how Jesus desires to heal us, to bind-up the broken hearted…and laid the foundation of inviting His Healing Presence into the pain of our lives…

But the fact is, pain (particularly emotional pain) often skews our perception of the real Jesus.  If we have a skewed perception, how can we hold our heart open to Him, let alone invite Him in to heal it?  Indeed, we may even hold Him responsible for the pain and wounds we have!  When emotional pain comes in childhood, there is an especially strong potential for a false perception of God to take root since children have limited experience, knowledge and ability to interpret the events taking place around them.  The mis-perception remains until the pain has actually seen some sort of intervention.  In the case of childhood pain, talking about the event or the feelings with safe loved ones, such as wise parents, is the intervention.  If this experience doesn’t take place, the pain and the perception is carried into adulthood.

These false perceptions reside in our emotional natures – for the most part.  What do I mean?  We may intellectually affirm the truth of Scripture as presented in the last post, but emotionally the false perception seems to be “truth”.   This is the proverbial “18 inches from head to heart” that all spiritual truth must travel!

So, what is your perception of God?

Our emotional nature presents a mental image that portrays what we really believe…so when you think of God, or Jesus, what is the first image that pops into your mind?  Resist the temptation to make this image be “more holy” or “more scriptural” than it may appear.  You want to use that first image that pops in, without censorship, because that is the perception you are using to filter all of how you think about God…and after all, He already knows what is deep within!  It please Him to bring these things gently to the light; He desires that we be aware of heart issues, hidden under layers of time and perhaps even pain.  Take a moment and write this down in your notebook or journal.  Or even sketch it out…

Ask (and journal these and the answers so that you don’t forget):  What is the emotion He (God) is feeling?  What is God doing?  What will He do next? What is His attitude towards you?   What is His behavior towards you?  Do your answers portray the “word picture” of Jesus as described in Matthew 11:28-30?

What has this exercise shown your about your perception of God?  Write this in your journal as well and keep it handy for next week!  Also, please consider sharing your findings or some insight you gained in the comments section below – I would love to know what you are discovering!