FIRST! Again

Credit: NASA, ESA, N. Smith (University of California, Berkeley), and The Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA)

In an extract from the teaching given at The Faith Mission Edinburgh Convention 2007, BILL BYGROVE speaks of God’s love.

God’s love is immense in calculation

God’s love is immense, beyond measure. “For as the heavens are high above the earth, so great is his mercy toward those that fear him. As far as the east is from the west, so far has he put our transgressions from us” (Isa.55:9).

Here the writer, David, is trying to explain and describe to us the immensity of the love of God. He does it in vertical and in horizontal terms.

As high as the heavens are above the earth

Here’s you and me. We’re about to get into a space rocket. Are you dressed in your suit? Helmet on? It’s the countdown…blast off! We go up into the atmosphere, the stratosphere, into the ionosphere. Then we go beyond the Andromeda galaxy. That’s never been done before. Then we go to the outer limits of space of this vast universe. It’s amazing!  The Hubble spacecraft identified planets 14 billion light years away from Earth.

Here’s you and me. We’re able to travel at the speed of light – 186 thousand miles per second, seven times round the world in one second. And yet it would take us, travelling at the speed of light, 14 billion years to get to the outer limits.

Now, said David: “For as the heavens are high above the earth [that's mind boggling in its immensity!] so great is his mercy toward those who fear him.” Those are the apple of his eye, the treasure of his heart, the object of his love, from all eternity to all eternity.

And as far as the east is from the west

That’s immeasurable, incalculable, because when we go east we eventually reach west, and when we go west we arrive at the east!  God hasn’t dealt with us in the way our sins deserve. So far has he removed our transgressions from us?

I wonder if I am speaking to someone who struggles every day with guilt.  Guilt has been called the “nerve end of all sorrow”.  If you have been to a dentist and the drill has hit  an exposed nerve end, you’ll know how painful that is. My Christian friend, perhaps you are crucified between the two thieves of yesterday and tomorrow. All your yesterdays catching up on you, you are fearful of tomorrow because of guilt.

 Listen to the immensity of God’s love. Listen! “As far as the east is from the west so far has he removed our transgressions from us.” Will you allow the flow of God’s Spirit to apply to your heart the truth of the immensity of God’s love for you?

ABOUT THE WRITER:
Bill Bygrove is the pastor at Bridge Chapel, Liverpool. If you visit the church’s website you will be able to download audio sermons from Bill.

ABOUT THE PHOTO:
Taken from the Hubble telescope, the illustration shows  a towering “mountain” of cold hydrogen gas laced with dust. It is the site of new star formation in the Carina Nebula. The great gas pillar is being eroded by the ultraviolet radiation from the hottest newborn stars in the nebula. With thanks to NASA and The Space Telescope Science Institute.