[Faith-talk] {Spam?} Daily Thought for Friday, June 17, 2016

[Paul Smith]

Hello and greetings to most of you for the second time today, and 
greetings to the daily thought posts after too long an absence.  I do 
hope that your day is going well, whether it be morning, afternoon or 
evening where you are as you read this message, by God's matchless 
grace and His providential care.

As we all know, in the United States and maybe in Canada this Sunday 
has been set aside to honor fathers, and it is with this in mind that 
the next two days' daily thought articles will deal with this subject.  
Unfortunately the author of the piece you are about to read is not 
given, but it is entitled "All Depends On Our Father," rendered as follows:

Some people take the attitude:  "God is too great, too busy, to remote, 
to be interested in me personally." That might be a complaint.  It 
might be false humility.  It might be wishful thinking on the part of 
someone who has a bad conscience and hopes that God is not interested 
in what he does.  But we should not measure God by our standards nor 
judge Him by our limitations.  He is God, and so His eye can be on the 
sparrow and His mind can number the very hairs of our heads.  He does 
not lose sight of our best interests or neglect our needs.  He is 
vitally interested in what we do with the gift of life.

The continued existence of all things depends on the Father-Creator.  
The seeds which the sparrow eats, the food of the fish in the sea, the 
crops which men harvest and the food we gather into baskets at the 
supermarket come from His generous hand.  The food itself, the strength 
to gather it, the ability of our bodies to turn that food into energy 
and strength are all gifts of His goodness.  He is not too great to 
care about these things.

At the wedding of Cana, Jesus did not refuse to provide wine on the 
basis that He had more important things to do--like redeeming the 
world.  So the Father does not refuse to give any further attention to 
the creature world on the ground that He is busy gathering the Church 
from the great mass of sinners.  If He should close His hand or turn 
His face, there would be no life on this earth.  Even those who deny 
His preserving care could not draw another breath without His power and 
care.  Those who refuse to look to Him or acknowledge their dependence 
on Him could not live another moment if He were not such a dependable 
God.  The same Spirit who moved over the face of the waters and changed 
chaos to cosmos is still lending the breath of life to all things, 
including mankind.  Each spring, each renewing of the earth, is 
evidence of His life-giving ways.  It is the same Spirit who teaches us 
that this IS our Father's world and enables us to appreciate that we 
can also depend on Him for eternal life in Jesus Christ, who has taught 
us to call the Creator and Preserver "Father."

Well, even though this article was brief, I hope and pray that you 
received some spiritual food from reading it, as I surely did.

And that will do it for today.  Until tomorrow when, Lord willing 
another daily thought message and article will be posted, may the God 
of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob just keep us safe, individually and 
collectively, in these last days in which we live.  Your Christian 
friend and brother, Paul