A Contemplative look into 2015

2015 is here with us . The old year is gone and behold we have another year, an opportunity of feasting in his blessings. at the beginning of last year I wrote something about what majority of us look into every other year .Its yet another periodic Chronometer where new year resolutions are trending like Hotcakes . Nevertheless I have chosen to approach this year from a contemplative angle.

A story is told of John and Mary who were having a walk down the beach during the Holidays .enjoying sun sand and surf. While taking, they kept walking faced each other with glaring eyes and John spoke more clearly and slowly as Mary was drawn and catapult in amazingly lovely daze and at this point they listened intently with their heart .

Why don’t we simply call this a contemplative moment. After reading this portion of story I had a whole different view of contemplation, reflection. We see the couple here had an amazing contemplative moment and I would assume that their relationship is simply marred by these kinds of moments.

The same it should be with us as regards our relationship with God. The end product of our relationship with God I believe is being catapult into him as he is even more catapult into us. It’s the love initiative which contemplates how depthious and intimate it can go.

I want to believe that these were such moments that King David would always have.

Psalm 27:4 I'm asking God for one thing, only one thing: To live with him in his house my whole life long. I'll contemplate his beauty; I'll study at his feet

David was a man assured of Gods love and in such a tabernacle he knew that he had limitless access for his enjoyment.

Why don’t you kick start 2015 from such a tone of contemplating on the goodness of God and getting stayed at his feet ?

 I was taught by my lecturer recently that the word contemplation as used modernly does not paint the intended meaning as it was used in the middle ages . The dictionary defines to contemplate as to think carefully and thoroughly .But according to the ancient use of the word, it used to mean that you are not only thinking about something but you are innately and thoroughly digesting what you are thinking about in love. Its as John and Mary in the story who are as much astounded by each other that what they need is their hearts to listen to one another.

Such is the extent of the love that gives identity to what we share with our father . To contemplate on Gods word is not simply about thinking about the word of God and probably derive some action points from the words you are reading but its about being fascinated by the word and the person of the word who is Christ .

Psalm 19:10-11 0 God's Word is better than a diamond, better than a diamond set between emeralds. You'll like it better than strawberries in spring, better than red, ripe strawberries. 11 There's more: God's Word warns us of danger and directs us to hidden treasure.(The message)

What about contemplating on the blissfulness of his love? That God hasn’t registered a scorecard against us? How about not being carried away by the numerous expectations, deadliness, Bills ,threats , opportunities,Challenges ,etc that away you in this year and simply dwell in the bosom of his love .

Lets begin to cherish the diamond betwixt the emeralds, yea lets grab the juice that saps out of his unadulterated word which is the wine of the new covenant.

Yes let this be yet another year where you reach for the best that God has for you. Not not your heart be full of contemplation of what  or how your year will turn out . Instead keep your hearts stayed in that treasure which is Christ himself and for sure he directs and guides and your path wont be devoid of joy and bliss .

the truth of seed

Mark 4:26-29 26 And he said, "The kingdom of God is as if a man should scatter seed on the ground. 27 He sleeps and rises night and day, and the seed sprouts and grows; he knows not how. 28 The earth produces by itself, first the blade, then the ear, then the full grain in the ear. 29 But when the grain is ripe, at once he puts in the sickle, because the harvest has come."

It’s a popular gospel of the 21stcentury. Sow a seed and you will be blessed . Or your blessing is in the seed. All these noises for a lack of a better word are centered towards commercializing the gospel and to make people inundated to somehow earn their blessings.

It’s utterly unbelievable how scriptures which are full of revelation and life can b twisted to suck life out of its very recipients. How on earth did sowing a seed ever mean that I am sowing to earn my blessing?

The most misinterpreted scripture as regards to this matter is that of Mark 4:26-29

Lets do a little bit of investigation and find out what is this seed that the scripture is talking about.

1. The seed is the word of God :

the context of this parable is about the kingdom of God . Jesus introduces this verse with the parable of the sower who sowed his seeds in different kinds of grounds. i. e the roadside, the thorny ground , the hard ground and the good soil . He then talks about the lamp under a basket which is hidden under a bed. Shortly after talking about the sower he talks about the kingdom of God being like a Mustard seed which is small but whn it grows up it becomes bigger than any other plant. Its clear that Jesus is talking about the kingdom of God which grows like a seed to become a big plant to its fruition .

2. The sower is God

God is the gardener; He plants the word in our hearts. We are not the primary sowers neither is the seed in any way connected to tithe or money just as it ha been portrayed for many years.

We all have been born of the incorruptible seed (1^st Peter 1:23) this seed is Christ who is the word.

The seed or the word has inherent capability to grow by itself to fruition. As the narrative says that the farmer sows the seed then he sleeps and rises and the plant grows up effortless.

Similarly the word of God has its inherent capacity to grow to the fullest extent in our hearts. We don’t force the word of God to grow in our hearts. To those who force people to plant their money in form of seed. Let them know that giving is a by product of the word of God bearing fruit in our lives.

3. The Ground is our heart .

The word of God settles in our hearts to which it experiences growth .

There are four types of grounds as pointed out in Mark 4:1-9. These four types of grounds represent the condition of the heart .

·        The road side: this type of ground represents a heart that lacks understanding . By roadside the seed cannot take ground. It’s a heart that is ignorant of the word of God. Many people including Believers are ignorant of the word of God. Do you know what the word says about God? About who you are? What is the word of God? Have we perceived the word of God to be a series of laws and commandments? The roadside represents a heart that hasn’t really encountered the word of God. Who is the person of the word ? Its Christ and him crucified . Everything in scripture expresses and speaks about him.

·        The Hard ground: this ground represents the heart that has received the word but has refused to take it in . This heart is always in dissension to believe the truth concerning the word, concerning Christ and what he has accomplished for us.

·        The thorny ground: this ground represents the heart that has encountered joy and growth from the word of God until something from without suddenly causes doubt.

·        The good ground: the heart that receives the word of God gladly . You believe in your heart unto salvation and you bear its fruits thereof.

Remember the word is the person of Christ. He is behind any explanation of scripture. In him everything holds together. Your heart was not created to struggle or strive against God . It’s a repository only where the word of God can settle grow to its full capacity .

In the old Testament we see that the heart of man is desperatelywicked above everything, but in the New Testament by the virtue of cleansing power of Christ you have been given a heart o flesh instead of a heart of stone. That prophecy by Isaiah finally has come to pass in Christ .

May the word of God take root in your heart beloveds . May any thorns or hardness be removed and done away with by the incessant power of the holy spirit in operation in you as you gladly respond to the promptings of God. You are blessed Beloved .

dead unto sin and alive unto God part 2

in my last post,  we saw what to be dead to sin really means.
We saw from romans 6:7 that he who is dead has been freed from sin.
Vs 8 if we really believe that we died with christ,  we must believe that we will also
Live by him and through him.
Apostle paul urges us to reckon ourselves dead to sin and alive unto God.
In this post,  we are going to address what really being alive unto God means.

      Romans 6:11 even so consinder yourselves dead to sin,  and your relationship
      From it broken,  but alive to God(living
 In unbroken fellowship with him)
     In christ jesus
(Amplified)
  I have found numerous people and believers who struggle with sin, guilt and a consciousness to having fallen short.
Condemnation is what the enemy likes us to dwell in.
He did this to Adam and eve and he does this to date. He is always a deciever, accuser of brethren.

When Paul is writing this i believe he is not talking about sinlessness.
How many times have we believed
That being alive unto God means
Being without sin? Sin in this case evil deeds.
Adam and Eve were without sin before the fall but were really not alive unto God,  they were just living souls.

The scriptures say that the first Adam was a living soul but the last adam, christ was a life giving spirit.  1st cor 15:46-47

Adam and eve didn't really grasp who they were and thats why they were dcieved by the serpent.
Well being alive unto God means that we are aware that welive by his spirit or rather he lives in us by the person of his spirit.
When we know that we will be strengthened to live a victorious life.
When you find yourself in some sort of sin

N:B sin as mentioned in romans and in most parts of NT is a noun,  from the root word Harmatia which means a nature of sin. In this case sinning verb paul referred to it as acts of the flesh,  sarx sinful nature.
For a believer you have been severed from sinful nature.  Sin is an outside entity trying to entice you to give in to it.

This makes so much difference for u as a believer who has received the free gift of righteousness that comes by grace.
You should reckon yourselves free from sin,  severed anbroken from it amd alive unto God.
If you are struggling with sin/acts of the flesh,  stop focusing on the sin and focus on christ. He is the lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world and always give that's and praise to him who saved you and redeemed your soul.
         Psalm 103:12 As far as the east is from the west,  thus far he has removes transgression from us.

Dead to Sin and Alive unto God, Part 1

This post is based on the inspiration of Emmanuel Rendas my facebook friend, through whom God has used to make me understand more about the sinful nature . Do Christians have sinful nature?
we need to understand what Christ has done and has been for us and until then, we will be squabbling in the dungeon of self pity and reckoning ourselves as sinners while we have been made something else, so here we go .Hope you get lessed by this .



 Many of us believers under grace heard already that we are already dead to sin.. But how ? Many of us know this ,but including me there's a lack of revelation on this "subject”. Sometimes Our Standards daily thoughts give us an answer of what we believe.. Why there's no condemnation when we sin? How many times we heard people saying that we must try to dead to Sin. The more we try the more become alive any tendency of Sin.

So let us understand what to be really Dead to sin means .



 Rom 6:7  For he that is dead is freed from sin.Rom 6:8  Now if we be dead with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him:Rom 6:9  Knowing that Christ being raised from the dead died no more; death had no more dominion over him.Rom 6:10  For in that He died, He died unto sin once: but in that He lived, He lived unto God.Rom 6:11  Likewise reckon you also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord Rom 6:14  For sin shall not have dominion over you: for ye are not under the law, but under grace.Rom 6:15  What then? shall we sin, because we are not under the law, but under grace? God forbid.  All words "Sin" here are a NOUN,never a VERB, only once in vs 15 is a Verb but what that means ?
  In Romans the word Sin is mentioned :   47 times – in Greek - SIN hamartia-(NOUN) (SINGULAR, people place or think)   Only once - hamartano- SIN (VERB) a sinful action and deed 




 Every-time that we find in Romans Jesus death or our death with Him its always in the “Past Tense”
 In the Greek is :
“Aorist Tense”- Denotes a act and a definitive action in the past... In other words, It has happen!!
"Perfect Tense"- Denotes a act completely done, completely ended and never to be repeated with a result effect in the present.
This two tenses are used every time that is talking about Jesus Death or our death with Him, our Co- crucifixion
When Jesus Cried at the Cross“ IT IS FINISHED” its a perfect tense, means that will not be repeated again. He as finished the work of removing our sin (NOUN) once and for all. We are eternally free from Sin (NOUN)
  
so we know that we have been set free from sin and not to sin. This is as a consequence of Christs death and ressurection.His death is our certificate of life, His life our certificate of victory.
there is something significant about Christ's ressurection. It was not enough that he just died for our sins but also with that one act of propitiation, He ressurected so that we can have a new lease of Life just as Romans 6:4 says .

rom6:4 the baptism of Christ In which we share In an equal stature shows us how dead we are and how alive and active we have raised up to life to walk in a kainos new way of life to the glory of God.(Kainos amplified)

Christ's previous deeds guarantees our freedom . Emmanuel seeks to reveal more of How indeed dead we are to sin.


with Him, our Co- crucifixion
When Jesus Cried at the Cross“ IT IS FINISHED” its a perfect tense, means that will not be repeated again. He as finished the work of removing our sin (NOUN) once and for all. We are eternally free from Sin (NOUN)
 But in the Bible context what means  ( SIN) as a NOUN ? 
 But wait ? Which Sin? Notice that the word Sin here is a NOUN (SINGULAR)..
 THE QUESTION IS . How Jesus died to Sin?
a To sinful actions and deeds
b. To the imputation, penalty and condemnation of Sin
 Did Jesus die for sinful actions and behavior? No, why? Because he had none. In different places of the Bible says that “He, Jesus, knew no sin, in Him had no sin,He did no sin.

2 Corinthians 5:21
 God made him who had no SIN (HAMARTIA) to be SIN (HAMARTIA) for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God

John 1:29 says Behold! The Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world!


 This SIN here that John is talking about is about the IMPUTATION OF SIN (Hamartia)Noun, not for Plural SINS (Hamartano) Verb... 

 But Which Imputation of SIN? Lets see Romans 5:17-21

Rom 5:17  For if by one man's offense death reigned by one; much more they which receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by one, Jesus Christ.) Rom 5:18  Therefore as by the offense of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation; even so by the righteousness of one the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life. Rom 5:19  For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous. Rom 5:20  Moreover the law entered, that the offense might abound. But where sin(HAMARTIA) abounded, grace did much more abound: Rom 5:21  That as SIN (Hamartia)had reigned unto death, even so might grace reign through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord. 

In the context of Romans 5 Paul is talking about the "ONE JUDGMENT AND CONDEMNATION" that came upon ALL man... By the disobedience of Adam all Humanity became Guilty before the Lord.

The Word Condemnation in this verse is "katakrima" that means (an adverse sentence (the verdict): - condemnation), and is the very same word that Paul use for Romans 8:1 when he says " There's no condemnation for those who are in Christ.

there is truly no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus for the law of spirit of life has set us free rom the law of sin and death .


 

At Home with God part 2.

We learn t in the previous post that God finds rest in us .God's home is no longer in a  spatial place that we would call heaven but Is in us It’s the climax of the love story where we and God dwell together and we find our refuge in him and he finds a dwelling place in us.

1. God is everywhere, We cant hide from him.

Psalm 139:1-15 O LORD, you have searched me and known me! 2 You know when I sit down and when I rise up; you discern my thoughts from afar. 3 You search out my path and my lying down and are acquainted with all my ways. 4 Even before a word is on my tongue, behold, O LORD, you know it altogether. 5 You hem me in, behind and before, and lay your hand upon me. 6 Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is high; I cannot attain it. 7 Where shall I go from your Spirit? Or where shall I flee from your presence? 8 If I ascend to heaven, you are there! If I make my bed in Sheol, you are there! 9 If I take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, 10 even there your hand shall lead me, and your right hand shall hold me. 11 If I say, "Surely the darkness shall cover me, and the light about me be night," 12 even the darkness is not dark to you; the night is bright as the day, for darkness is as light with you. 13 For you formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my mother's womb. 14 I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; my soul knows it very well. 15 My frame was not hidden from you, when I was being made in secret, intricately woven in the depths of the earth.

God knows us, even if we doubt ourselves there is a supreme being who knows us perfectly and forever. He is not confused about us. He is aware of our rising up and of our lying down.

David knew this and concluded that there is nothing he could do to flee from God. This is true and yet we find in our churches that we are so used to playing the Church game as if God is playing hide and seek with us.

We are used to the draw nearer to God and he will draw nearer to us phenomenon not discerning the times we are living in and not discerning the presence of God by the person of his spirit who is everywhere. There is something about God that he is everywhere with us, a knowledge too wonderful for us such that we need his spirit to testify to our spirit that we are sons of God.

Isn’t it wonderful that even if we lay our pits in hell, there God will find us ? He is a friend who sticks closer than a brother. He will always come to your rescue even if you doubt him and are confused about yourself.

Don’t you know that he who is joined with the lord with the lord has become one spirit? He and not you took the initiative of this union. God loves you and has joined himself to you with an everlasting covenant the result which everything has become new. God and man can have an uninterrupted fellowship which is perfect and forever.

2. He is Emmanuel, God with us

God refuses to be God by himself and decides to be God with us . God loves to dwell among his people. God is union. He is all about relationship, always looking forward to pour himself to us.

Man on the other side is not complete without relationship. That explains why we are always looking forward to belong to a particular group. The re is so much solidarity and strength and purpose that is just derived from having belonged to family. God is the genesis of all this system. We find a sense of purpose direction and life when we know that there is a supreme being about us.

Jesus explains, expounds the heart of the father. He said “he who eats of me will never hunger and he who drinks of me will never thirst”. His body is real food and his blood is true drink. Jesus in his mission reveals god as one who is with us and not separate from us. In fact he reveals humanity to be united with God where man feasts on God literally and finds life in him alone.

Its our heritage to dwell with God having an uninterrupted fellowship full of bliss. This is what the gospel announces. The gospel is good news that makes a man leap with joy . Its news that announces God and man are now united and joined with a strand of love that cannot be broken. No wonder the gospel is so sweet and provides an everlasting assurance of our souls that we re at peace with God .we calll God Abba father

Rom 5:1-2 Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. 2 through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God.

Through Christ we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God.

The glory of God is manifested when God is revealed amongst us and in us. Its not enough that God is magnified in the heavens alone but God invests his glory, his manifold power, his love, his fullness in man. What a glory that is ours in Christ Jesus.

At Home with God

When God finished His work of creation, he rested. Its not as if he was tired and wearied but he looked at the awesome work that he had done and said that indeed it was good.. It was good in the hands the perfect craftsman until he rested.

 

Gen 2:2-3And on the seventh day God finished his work that he had done, and he rested on the seventh day from all his work that he had done. 3 So God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it God rested from all his work that he had done in creation.

So God accomplished his purpose of creation and rested. We can say God entered into rest in his creation .Isnt that just marvelous! That God of creation would sovereignty find rest in his creation. Its not the kind of rest that you find from a tiring and a daunting task but it’s a sovereign rest of accomplishment.

God made us in his own image and declared that behold man is very good. Man in this act then is immediately the prime recipient of God’s rest in which we rest in him having found a home in him.

This is the kind of rest that God has prepared for his people, His treasured possession.

This is the kind of destiny that David had envisioned in his psalm.

Psalm 23 1 The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want. 2 He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters. 3 He restores my soul. He leads me in paths of righteousness for his name's sake. 4 Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me 5 You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; you anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows. 6 Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I shall dwell in the house of the LORD forever.

David who was a shepherd knows innately of His God as the chief shepherd. Shepherd who does not merely look after the sheep but is the chief overseer of all that he is. He knows his shepherd as the one who makes him rest and the restorer of his soul. He knows his shepherd as the one who guides him even on the advent of danger and as the one who prepares a meal for him in the midst of his enemies.

Enmity in my view is anything that will prevent us from being at home and at rest in God. We were first enemies in our own minds and alienated from God.(Col 1: 22) Man is the one who ran away from God and not God who ran away from man . Yet God is the chief restorer of our souls who has brought us near to himself in his body of flesh by death . (Col 1:22). Something very fundamental happened in this operation that really portrays how dear and close we are to God. He reconciled us in his body and not in any subsidiary or intermediate form. The body of God is his home, is his temple, and is his dwelling place.

Jesus defined the home of God as his mansion which has many rooms. He reconciled us back to God again. He proved that we really belonged to God.

He came to his own yet his own rejected Him (John 1:12).

Do you know that God finds his Home in you?

We usually sing how lovely is your dwelling places ooh God. We know God to dwell in heaven; a celestial space up above and beyond this limited universe yet through Prophet Isaiah God proclaims that not even the heavens can hold him.

Isa 66:1 Thus says the LORD: "Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool; what is the house that you would build for me, and what is the place of my rest?

We usually allocate God a spatial location of dwelling but God doesn’t reside in things made by hands .

Vs 2 All these things my hand has made, and so all these things came to be, declares the LORD. But this is the one to whom I will look: he who is humble and contrite in spirit and trembles at my word.

God looks for someone. Gods heart has always been for man, that God and man would dwell together and so in the fullness of time Jesus was manifested as the word of God ; as the one in whom the fullness of God dwells .(John 1, Col 1.) And paul refers to us as the temple of God, the dwelling place of God whom God will not join with a harlot.

1^st Cor6: 17 But he who is joined to the Lord becomes one spirit with him. 18 Flee from sexual immorality. Every other sin a person commits is outside the body, but the sexually immoral person sins against his own body. 19 Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, 20 for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.

You have been joined with God hence becoming one spirit with him. God has infused himself in us and we have been infused in him and yet this is not a secondary operation but the design of God from the beginning.

This is why we are told to honor God with our bodies because we are a house containing God in the person of his spirit.

What a joy to find our dwelling place with God. We are in a mystical union. Don’t see yourself as an outsider, You belong to God and God belongs to You. The spirit of the sovereign God dwells in you. This is the good news that the gospel announces. Man has been reconciled to God. Man now has God as his everlasting enjoyment. Follow the second post on this topic as we explore what being at Home with God means to us today, cheers .

His banner over us ,,,,,,

Song of Songs 2:1-4 I am a rose of Sharon, a lily of the valleys.

Like a lily among thorns is my darling among the maidens.

Like an apple tree among the trees of the forest is my lover among the young men. I delight to sit in his shade, and his fruit is sweet to my taste. 4 He has taken me to the banquet hall, and his banner over me is love.

I can’t get enough this soap opera that ensues in this book of Songs. The beloved story continues all the time. In our last post we examined the exchanges between the lover and the beloved in a bit. We saw the beloved captivated by her lover but she recoils back and she is intimidated by the texture of her skin. Meanwhile the lover pursues and showers her with love despite her murmurings. We also saw that this love story is a picture of our relationship with God which climaxes in Christ who entices us with love and we are captivated by him. I cant get enough of the way God is always in the mission of love.

The conversation carries on as the beloved says that she is a rose of Sharon, a lily of the valleys. Rose of Sharon is a depiction of different species of flowering plants that are highly valued. The beloved discovers her value, she is extremely valued, a lily of the valleys.

This is how the Wycliffe Bible commentary describes the Rose of Sharon

I am the rose of Sharon. The bride is still speaking. It is difficult to determine which flower the bride refers to. The only other occurrence of the word in the OT is in Isa 35:1. Crocus appears to be the best translation. Sharon is the Mediterranean coastal plain between Joppa and Caesarea. In the time of Solomon it was a place of great fertility.( (Charles F. Pfeiffer, The Wycliffe Bible Commentary, Old Testament, (Chicago: Moody Press) 1962.)

His banner over us,,,,,,,,,,

So we can see How esteemed we can be when we realize how beautiful and loving we are. It’s like glowing and reflecting the same light which shines on us as in a mirror.This is actuually a mystical union

The lover replies and describes her beauty in a more phenomenal way like a lily among the thorns is my darling. We must use a lot of typology here to suck all the juice from this love story, after all Christ is the perfection of any love story. We will discover that Christ is really the rose of Sharon, he is the valuable fragrant lily of the valley, most valuable and to be desired of men.

The Lover echoes her beloved’s new found status by describing her as a darling, a lily among the thorns, what a picture of our God resonating with us in love. She s not only a lily but a lily uniquely found amongst thorns, she is conspicuously beautiful and captivates her lover.

This is what God sees in us. Value. We carry within us treasure. That is the beauty of being human. We are treasures in earthen vessels ,,, yea that sounds like lily among the pricky thorns . Out of the miry clay we are formed and established upon the rock who is Christ.

What a status we have now? We are loved and actually this is the status we had right from the point of our creation. For God Chose us in Christ before the creation of the world to be Holy and blameless, in Love he predestined us to be adopted as his sons in conformation to his pleasure and will.(Eph 1:4-5)

love has been our design ever since . Our true design is compatible with love . Like the beloved we resonate with an accurate expression. We have been taken into the banquet hall and showered with love immense. His banner over us is love. God is in the eternal activity of loving us.

Love has set everything in motion, its like the software that runs every system harmoniously. We have been installed in love and the fruit of his love has become sweet to our taste. We know this because of our capability and potential to love and to respond to love. All this is in conformation to his will. The way God has designed us is that he is sure that we have everything good and fit within us to love and to respond to love. We just have to pay attention to the symphony that is in the atmosphere for the glory of God fills the earth like a canopy. I believe the glory of God is also in his love. Gods love is immense and great and available to our joy and bliss. If surely there was no love, the universe would not be running.