"The Lord kills and mades alive;

He brings down to Sheol and raises up.

The Lord makes poor and rich;

He brings low, He also exalts."

Samuel2:6-7

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Everything belongs to God. EVERYTHING! Not only is He self-governing but He has the right to govern everyone and all things. Think about the rightness of that for a minute. A position such as His...a position of such magnitude, is hard for us to understand I know. It is above us and beyond us as human beings. There is no like earthly position or power or authority anywhere on earth. There is none that is equal. But in spite of our inability to comprehend the sovereignty of God, it is an important issue just the same. One that we should expose ourselves to and consider.

Unfortunately the Lord's sovereignty is a subject that often gets lost in the shuffle when it comes to our personal quest to know and understand Him. We're human. We tend to explore and focus-in-on those aspects of God's nature that appeal to us and, to be brutally honest, minister to our O-so self centered and needy egos. For example: God is love. We like to think about that one. Or there is the fact of His ever-presence. That's another one we focus on and derive much comfort and benefit from. Then there is His energy and super-natural power that He is willing to share with us. Being the weak and needy people that we are we gravitate towards those characteristics that promise to benefit us the most. It's only natural, unfortunately. But the fact is, ultimately, when we examine God's sovereignty, embrace, and submit to the fact that he has the right to rule over us, in the end, that is what sets us free from self and this fallen world and Satan's power over us. You see it is when we examine and explore and submit to God's sovereign rule over our lives...that we grow and excel and serve God the most effectively.

I suppose the bottom-line in all of this is, who can stand in the presence of God and not be humbled? Who can stand in the light of His infinite power and remain arrogant and apathetic to the awe-inspiring fact of who He is? And who can grapple with the fact of His sovereignty and the right He has to govern our lives and not be changed, from within? Listen to what Isaiah wrote,

"'In the year of King Uzziah's death,

I saw the Lord sitting on a throne,

lofty and exalted,

with the train of His robe filling the temple'

and then he exlaimed,

'Woe is me,

for I am ruinted.'"

(See Isaiah 6:1-5)

Isaiah saw God. In an instant he knew that God was the Master of All, including him. And until you and I see that we were created by God and saved by God and that He does have the right to live in and through us and rule over us...we will never be the first class saints and servants God intended and needs us to be.

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The Christian instincts of trust and worship

are stimulated very powerfully by

the knowledge of the greatness of God.

J.I. Packer