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[MolyRoly]

What is God like relationally? How does he perceive me? How should I perceive Him?

[jimwalton]

I started in Romans. The Bible is just chock full of answers, like a Halloween bag at the end of the evening. They are everywhere you read. So, I'm just giving you what Romans says, but I thought it would be good enough to start the conversation of "What is God like relationally"?

1. He is filled with love for you (Rom. 1.7; 5.8).

2. He shows anger mixed with grief against godless and unjust people (Rom. 1.18; 2.3, 6). We expect and appreciate that God has to be fair about that (Rom. 2.2). People who hurt other people show a continuing, driving contempt for God as well as for other individuals and society. If he treated evil people with as much acceptance as his own people, we’d think he was wacked.

3. Even though we are godless and unjust, however, he keeps reaching out to us to turn us around (Rom. 3.23-25). What he wants to do is give us a free gift of being united with Him instead of being separated, as an act of grace.

4. Jesus died for us to demonstrate that God wanted to be more than fair in giving us a chance to have a relationship with him (Rom. 3.25; 5.8).

5. These free gifts of grace, and the relationship with God, are thankfully not something we have to earn or deserve (Rom. 4.2-5ff; Rom. 5.1-2). It's Christmas all year long.

5. God will not interfere with your free will, though (Rom. 1.24, 28). His love for you demands that he allow you to act as an autonomous entity, and to follow your own heart, even if it’s to your own detriment (Rom. 1.29). His choice to love you includes risk that you won’t love back and that you'll act to your own detriment despite everything.

6. He acts respectably (Rom. 2.2), and therefore we should worship him. He doesn’t do anything wrong. (Rom. 1.25; 2.6-11)

7. He wants us to know him (Rom. 1.28). That’s why he reveals himself.

8. God is patient with people (Rom. 1.32). Though their actions show they’re worthy of death, God doesn’t just strike us dead, but is patient, continuing to reveal himself, trying to woo us back to himself (Rom. 2.4; 8.1). He doesn’t condemn unless we just refuse to see the truth.

9. He wants to make us his children and treat us like family (Rom. 8.14-17). There doesn’t need to be any fear. He has put us in his will, so to speak, to inherit everything He is and has.

10. He helps us in our weakness. He knows how hard this is for us, and he doesn’t leave us to do it by ourselves (Rom. 8.26; 13.14; 15.5). The Holy Spirit Himself even prays for us.

11. God is cheering us on (Rom. 8.32-39). He wants us to succeed in this. He does everything He can to bring us success, completion, and wholeness.

12. God accepts us if we will just come to Him (Rom. 10.9-13; 15.7).


I hope that helps to answer your question. This is just what Romans says, but it's nicely representative of what you'll find anywhere else in the Bible.