Built for Connection

Yahweh. El Shaddai. The Creator of the Universe wants to have a personal relationship with you. With me. Does that sound ridiculous to you? Humans are build for connection. There is an entire science based on that; psychology.

Are you happy in your relationships?
What have you tried already?
Drugs, alcohol, sex? All of the above?

If you’ve tried it all already and still don’t feel fulfilled, why not try Jesus? What have you got to lose?
Trying Jesus doesn’t cost you anything…

Are you tired of running from God?
Why not ask Him to reveal Himself to you and show you what His love for you is all about?

It seems to me that often times it’s the people who hit rock bottom who find Jesus first.

Look at Jelly Roll. He was an addict, in prison, where he was in a perpetual cycle of bondage for years. He found Jesus in prison and turned his life around. He is no longer an addict. He was set free. Listen to his testimony here:

Is Jelly Roll perfect? Of course not (sorry, Jelly Roll). None of us are. But God loves us, anyway. Doesn’t that blow your mind?

Still not convinced that humans are built for connection, and specifically with a higher power, The Creator? Look at movies, games, comics, superhero stories… what do so many have in common? In Star Wars what is The Force all about? Isn’t that a higher power? In Avatar, Eywa, The Great Mother. In the Marvel comics, The-One-Above-All. Look at all the mythological gods. Look at all the gods that so many civilizations have created all throughout history. Why would humans spend so much time worshipping, seeking, creating, and writing about higher beings if we weren’t hard-wired to do it?

Through it all, there is only one true God, and that is the Great I am. For can any other God say that they created the universe and man-kind? There is a wonderful story in the book of 1 Kings (OId Testament) about a prophet who is showing the people who the one true God is. Here’s the scripture (since I can’t write it better than God did). Watch out, it’s a bit long. In biblical times, it was customary to burn sacrifices to God, for atonement. I won’t go into any more detail about that here. For now, just know that this is what’s going on in the story (you’re of course welcome to research it on your own).

1 Kings 18:20-39 (NIV)
²⁰ So Ahab sent word throughout all Israel and assembled the prophets on Mount Carmel. ²¹ Elijah went before the people and said, “How long will you waver between two opinions? If the Lord is God, follow him; but if Baal is God, follow him.”

But the people said nothing.

²² Then Elijah said to them, “I am the only one of the Lord’s prophets left, but Baal has four hundred and fifty prophets. ²³ Get two bulls for us. Let Baal’s prophets choose one for themselves, and let them cut it into pieces and put it on the wood but not set fire to it. I will prepare the other bull and put it on the wood but not set fire to it. ²⁴ Then you call on the name of your god, and I will call on the name of the Lord. The god who answers by fire—he is God.”

Then all the people said, “What you say is good.”

²⁵ Elijah said to the prophets of Baal, “Choose one of the bulls and prepare it first, since there are so many of you. Call on the name of your god, but do not light the fire.” ²⁶ So they took the bull given them and prepared it.

Then they called on the name of Baal from morning till noon. “Baal, answer us!” they shouted. But there was no response; no one answered. And they danced around the altar they had made.

²⁷ At noon Elijah began to taunt them. “Shout louder!” he said. “Surely he is a god! Perhaps he is deep in thought, or busy, or traveling. Maybe he is sleeping and must be awakened.” ²⁸ So they shouted louder and slashed themselves with swords and spears, as was their custom, until their blood flowed. ²⁹ Midday passed, and they continued their frantic prophesying until the time for the evening sacrifice. But there was no response, no one answered, no one paid attention.

³⁰ Then Elijah said to all the people, “Come here to me.” They came to him, and he repaired the altar of the Lord, which had been torn down. ³¹ Elijah took twelve stones, one for each of the tribes descended from Jacob, to whom the word of the Lord had come, saying, “Your name shall be Israel.” ³² With the stones he built an altar in the name of the Lord, and he dug a trench around it large enough to hold two seahs^[a] of seed. ³³ He arranged the wood, cut the bull into pieces and laid it on the wood. Then he said to them, “Fill four large jars with water and pour it on the offering and on the wood.”

³⁴ “Do it again,” he said, and they did it again.

“Do it a third time,” he ordered, and they did it the third time. ³⁵ The water ran down around the altar and even filled the trench.

³⁶ At the time of sacrifice, the prophet Elijah stepped forward and prayed: “Lord, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Israel, let it be known today that you are God in Israel and that I am your servant and have done all these things at your command. ³⁷ Answer me, Lord, answer me, so these people will know that you, Lord, are God, and that you are turning their hearts back again.”

³⁸ Then the fire of the Lord fell and burned up the sacrifice, the wood, the stones and the soil, and also licked up the water in the trench.

³⁹ When all the people saw this, they fell prostrate and cried, “The Lord—he is God! The Lord—he is God!”

Now I know there are some of you who believe that the stories in the Bible are just that, stories. And that’s fine, you can believe that. But just consider for a moment, Baal was the Phoenician god of fertility and weather. Baal was made by human hands. When is the last time you saw a slab of stone do anything other than be a slab of stone?

My God is a God of miracles. He’s real and He will show up for you if you ask Him, earnestly.

As a side note, there is a beautiful description about idols in my favorite Bible book, Isaiah. Here it is:
Isaiah 44:6-20. I like to read it out loud to myself since it’s so poetic.

After reading about the prophet Elijah and about idols, you decide which God you want in your corner. A stone or wooden god made by man’s hands, or a living, Almighty God who created said stone and wood! If you still don’t believe it, I challenge you to pray to a God you don’t believe in and ask Him to show Himself to you! See what happens.

Psalms 106:20

They exchanged their glorious God for an image of a bull, which eats grass.