The Relationship Between God and Man
God desires to have a healthy growing relationship with us. He loved us before we loved Him and took the initiative of reconciling with us after the fall of the first man. God seeks to establish a functional relationship with us regardless of our social or economic status. He is blind to our shortcomings for nothing can separate us from His love.
The Alienation of Man
Sin is not the only thing that alienates man from God. Pride is also an obstacle in the relationship between God and His people. Pride is the ancient sin that made God chase away Lucifer and a host of other angels from heaven. They were cast to the ground and God condemned them to eternal suffering.
People are mostly humble when they are not empowered. They change when they are blessed with possessions and both their social and economic statuses improve. Such new levels attract new friends and access to many previously inaccessible things.
Changes like these can make God withdraw His presence in our lives. Ungodliness sets in when we get influenced by new friends who do not have the fear of the Lord. At this point, God tries to mend His relationship with us through His servants or the Holy Spirit convicting our conscious to depart from our evil ways.
It is a difficult battle between good and evil that most people lose because they yield to the desires of the flesh and neglect the will of the spirit. God abides by His principles that He does not overrule our choices no matter how bad they could be.
He allows us to make choices which we will harbor their consequences. Nevertheless, God’s call on those languishing in worldly pleasure is one – remember the Lord your God.
Remember The Lord Your God
Apostle Paul writes in his letter to the church in Rome that neither death nor life, height or depth, nor things present or in the future can separate us from the love of Christ. His love for us is unconditional. However, can the same be said of our love for God? Are we faithful in loving Him through thick and thin?
Most people abandon the faith after their prayers are answered. They forget that God is responsible for the far they have come. Not a single person can proudly say that the Lord was not involved in their accomplishments.
God is the only one who genuinely wishes us well. Our close friends and relatives cannot replicate God’s love. They can turn against you as Jesus foretold that a man’s enemies are the people of his household.
When your plans are established and doors of blessings open in your life, remember the Lord who put you in that position. God is neither unfair nor dishonest to want to relate with you only after your success.
Remember Him who blessed your work and businesses. The Lord your God was the only refuge you had before your success. Do not forget his contribution to your elevation.
God is The Anchor of Your Success
You attribute your success to God and nobody else. No degree of accomplishments can displace His position in your life. He is not the equivalent of your education, wealth, or social status.
The bible records in Deuteronomy that the Lord gives us the power to become rich. He blesses the work of our hands and expands our territories. It is illogical to forget the one responsible for your achievements. Remember God in all situations and resist the temptation of giving yourself all the glory.
God does not take usurping His power lying low. He clearly says that He does not share His glory with anybody else. Acknowledging God in all your endeavors is a way of remembering Him and preaching His glory.
Do not allow success to cloud your judgment lest God removes the crown of glory from your head. The people once praised Herod as he was addressing them and said that his voice was not of a mortal but that of a god. God was utterly displeased with him and an angel of God struck him dead immediately.
If God did not spare a ruler of Herod’s stature who was taking His glory, what more will He do to anyone who follows Herod’s steps?
Consequences of Forgetting about The Lord
There are consequences of forgetting about God. He wants us to strictly remember and acknowledge Him in our lives. We should exalt Him above everything else we treasure. God does not play the second fiddle.
The second commandment God gave Moses was that the Israelites shall not have any graven image or likeness of anything in heaven, on earth, or in water. God is explicit on the level of esteem he wants to be held in. He legislated it in the ten commandments to be observed by all generations to come.
What are the consequences of forgetting about God?
1. He delivers you to the enemy
God has given Israel to her enemies severally when they strayed from the covenant. He sent them to exile in Babylon for seventy years as prophet Jeremiah had prophesied.
Israel had at that time abandoned the ways of God and was influenced by her neighbors to worship foreign gods. They intermarried with other nations that defiled them as a nation that God had appointed to Himself.
2. He publicly humiliates you
God had made King Nebuchadnezzar more successful than his neighbors. One day, he looked at His Kingdom and said that it was he who had transformed the nation to achieve its stature.
God was angry at him and immediately spoke to him that he would be taken away from people and eat grass like oxen for seven years. After the expiry of the stipulated duration, God would restore him to humanity. His experience would serve as a lesson for everyone not to take God’s glory.
King Nebuchadnezzar was humiliated before his subjects for seven years when God took away his sanity and replaced it with that of a beast.
In conclusion, remembering the Lord is not a request but God’s command to us. He is pleased when we accord Him the respect He deserves.
