“Religion is the human search for God; Christianity is God’s search for humans.” — James Bryan Smith

Have you ever seen the ceiling of The Sistine Chapel? I haven’t either – personally – but I’ve seen pictures. One of the amazing paintings by Michelangelo is The Creation of Adam, depicting Adam reclining and reaching toward God. God, surrounded by angels, in turn is reaching down from heaven toward Adam. They reach and reach, seemingly straining toward each other and are only separated by what seems like an inch.

Except that inch would later become a chasm of endless width, breadth, and depth. It is filled with my deepest, darkest thoughts. It is filled with my most wicked acts and deeds. It is filled with secrets. It is filled with sin. My sin. Your sin. Our sin.

In His great love for us, God gave us the gift of eternal living through the death and life of His Son, Jesus Christ. He came to us. He wanted us. He made a way. We owe it all to Him. We didn’t go looking for Him. While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. We were stuck drowning in our own chasm of darkness. It’s all His doing. We have tried reaching for Him for millenia. In one instant, He reached out for us and bridged the widest canyon in human history.

And He still is reaching for us today.

That’s why it’s called the Good News.

(Thanks to my friend Nancy Jo for posting in Facebook the short sentence at the top of this post. It’s from the book we’re all reading at church written by James Bryan Smith. Actually, over 250 people are reading from the same chapter of the same books each week for the past nine months, and that is a powerful thing. Lives have been changed… mine included. I highly recommend them. You can find them HERE.)