God-Lite

I started a diet about a week ago.  I also joined a gym, which is a first for me.  Let me tell you - it's been awesome!!!  I love reading my Nook while busting it on the treadmill or listening to a song or two from the LOST Season 4 Soundtrack while sweating like a pig in the steam room.  Jack LOVES the Kid Club area which is a bonus.  It's nice to actually do something that I hope will result in less back pain and a healthier me.

Yesterday after church, I picked the kids up some lunch from the golden arches.  They asked for pies.  (Seriously, pies!  I tried to convince them to get a burger or something to go with their pies, but honestly, that's just bad with a side of awful.  So I let them have pies for lunch!) 

Obviously, I didn't have any pie.  (If I'm going to screw up my diet, it's gonna be on the Girl Scout cookies I have in my freezer that I bought from a dear friend and not on a silly McD's pie!)  But the SMELL of the pies in the car as the kids were enjoying them was just strong enough to let me know that they would TASTE pretty yummy.  The smell of the pies gave me a hint of what my taste buds would have enjoyed had I taken a bite.

And I realized that I experience God in sort of the same way.

When I went shopping for groceries last, I picked up fat-free sour cream, 75% fat-free cheese, skim milk, light mayo, sugar-free pudding.  Smelling that hint of apple pie made me wonder whether I have a Light God.  Maybe an anger-free God.  Or a wrath-free God.  Or a 75% good God. 

I have always been aware that my understanding of God, my 'version' of God, is just a hint of Him.  That when I die and go to heaven and meet Him face to face, I will meet THE GOD, exactly and 100% as He is.  Full-Authority God.  100% Evil-Free God.  100% Love and Grace God.  High in Justice and Mercy.  Saturated with Good and Holiness and Righteousness.

My hint of Him, my blurry, static-y, light version of Him makes me incredibly terrified and overwhelmingly eager to meet the whole Him!  I can hardly imagine Him being MORE than how I 'see' Him now.  But won't it be awesome (!!!!!) to be able to experience Him exactly how He is!!!  Better than actually biting into that McD's apple pie, I'm sure.