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HOW GREAT THOU ART

Multnomah Publishers

Chapter One

THE MAJESTY OF GOD

YOURS, O LORD, IS THE GREATNESS AND THE POWER AND THE GLORY AND THE MAJESTY AND THE SPLENDOR.

1 Chronicles 29:11

January 1

who is god?

For who is God besides the LORD? And who is the Rock except our God?

(2 SAMUEL 22:32)

DAY 1

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What is God-what, but the Lord God? For who is the Lord but the Lord? Or who is God save our God? Most high, most excellent, most powerful, most almighty, most merciful, and most just; most hidden, yet most present; most beautiful, and most strong; stable, yet mysterious; unchangeable, yet changing all things; never new, never old; making all things new and bringing age upon the proud, though they do not know it; always working, yet always at rest; still gathering, yet lacking nothing; sustaining, filling and protecting; creating, nourishing, and maturing; seeking, yet possessing all things.

God loves without passion; He is jealous without anxiety; He repents, yet has no sorrow; is angry, yet serene; changes His ways, yet His plans are unchanged; recovers what He finds, having never lost it; never in need, yet rejoicing in gain; never covetous, yet requiringinterest. He receives over and above, that He may owe-yet who has anything that is not His? He pays debts, owing nothing; remits debts, losing nothing.

And what can anyone say when they speak of Him? Yet woe to those who keep silent, since those who say the most are as the mute!

January 2

when tongues fall silent

I know that you can do all things; no plan of yours can be thwarted.... Surely I spoke of things I did not understand, things too wonderful for me to know.

(Job 42:2-3)

DAY 2

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The mind of man cannot fittingly conceive how great is God and how majestic His nature. Nor has human eloquence the power to express His greatness. For all eloquence is certainly mute and every mind inadequate to conceive and to utter His majesty.

Whatever can be thought about Him is less than He; whatever can be uttered about Him will be less than He when compared with Him. When we are silent, we can experience Him to some extent, but we cannot express Him in words as He really is.

If the keen sight of our eyes grows dim by looking at the sun so that their gaze is overpowered by the bright rays that meet them, so our mental vision undergoes this very thing in its every thought of God. The more it endeavors to contemplate God, the more is it blinded by the light of its own thought.

What can you say about Him that is worthy of Him-He who is more sublime than all sublimity, loftier than all loftiness, more profound than all profundity, brighter than all light, more brilliant than all brilliance, more splendid than all splendor, mightier than all might, more powerful than all power, more beautiful than all beauty, truer than all truth, stronger than all strength, greater than all majesty, more potent than all potency, richer than all riches, kinder than all kindness, better than all goodness, more just than all justice, and more merciful than all mercy? Every kind of virtue must of necessity be less than He who is the God and Author of them all. Nothing really can be compared to Him, for He is above everything that can be said of Him.

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Excerpted from HOW GREAT THOU ART by STEVE HALLIDAY & WILLIAM TRAVIS Copyright © 1999 by Steve Halliday and William Travis
Excerpted by permission. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.

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