The Great Attractor

Tiny particles, bundled together at the core of our atoms create a nucleus that exerts an influence upon electrons and other atoms. Larger bonds make up cells that attract yet other cells which make up organs. Many interconnected organs make up organisms. Simply, purely awesome! What a Creator!

Here we are, bound together … not just as cells and organs but also as bodies belonging to families, communities, nations and continents. Our planet is bound to a solar system which is bound to a swirl of millions and billions of stars and planetary systems revolving around the core of our Milky Way galaxy. This galaxy is one of a grouping of 16 galaxies occupying just a small portion of other galaxies which are often bound together in huge bubble-like structures. Everything is expanding from a beginning point. It takes quite an imagination to think that all matter, seen and unseen was once squeezed together into a beginning point of condensed “everything.” What observations indicate is that everything has expanded from some unimaginably compressed tiny beginning point. Call it the “Big Bang” if you wish, but the Bible says that in the beginning all was created by the Word of God. God simply said or willed, “Let there be” … and everything became what we now behold. Wow.

But is there more woven into our core? A deeper Wow? Might we be more than the sum of our parts … called by a deeper, timeless, inner Attractor?

I believe that in Jesus we have a “Yes” to that question.

Jesus drew from his studies of the scriptures a God who deeply cared about his people. In the Old Testament God saw suffering and cared. Indeed, his “chosen” people were to be caregivers of both creation and others by the choices they made and how worshiped and welcomed the “stranger, widow and orphan.” Embraced by God’s Spirit of Compassion he called everyone to God’s healing and grace – regardless of their background, religion or race. How did that love become attractive?

The Bible tells us that God, the Great Attractor if you will, chose Jesus to become the focal point of that attraction. And so we call him Lord. But he is first Friend! We know that people flocked to Jesus because he reflected a love they had never known. Ordinary men and women, Jews and Non-Jews, saints and sinners, losers and the lost … they were all welcomed by Jesus, God’s great attractor! He embraced all with God’s grace: “Peace be with you … your faith has made you well … Go, love as I have loved you.” Yet we also know that this kind of love cost Jesus his life by crucifixion.

Indeed, Jesus knew (or certainly discovered) that this love would not be received by those who do not live by love. “Take up your cross and follow me,” he said. That might sound grim, yet Jesus told his disciples, “Greater things shall you do because I go to the Father.” Jesus knew where the Power was. Be still … pray …be empowered by the Spirit of God. With God, all things are possible. Even those of us who very much want to live by love are cracked vessels … we leak! So has God failed? NO. Leaky vessels have filled our world with the love of God in Jesus. Never mind our cracks … God pours love in … again and again. Amazing grace! So wonderfully attractive!

Jesus didn’t push or insist on change … important as that is. He invited us all by giving his all. Now there’s a WOW! What a gift yet a mystery, too. Why does God choose to attract instead of insist? Somehow, our created freedom requires that we be attracted for the love God desires to be genuine. We love because he first loved us. We can let ourselves be changed by love … yet we find ourselves resisting. There’s irony here … even conflict. Yet God is faithful and gives us the faith to receive. God, I believe, help thou my unbelief! Inspiring, attractive … yet always challenging … just like love? Hummm.

Currently we’re looking at The Celebration of Discipline by Richard Foster. This is a loving tool of God. Seeking and listening, we pray that love might come in greater measure … to us, for us, through us. Attracted we hope to become more attractive … by the Spirit growing within us. “I will make you fishers of men,” Jesus told Peter. But we also know that he first he said, “Come, follow me.” There’s the attraction. Creatures called for re-creation! It sure worked for Peter and millions more! Good news? Yes, indeed.

Celebrating the Attractor! …………………. Pastor Dan