John 20: 28
Thomas answered and said to Him, "My Lord and my God!"
"My Lord" is Kyrios--Lord, Master, Controller, Boss.
"My God" is Theos--God.
When Thomas' faith was seriously and severely shaken by the Crucifixion of Jesus, he found it incredulous that the others could say He was alive, after seeing Him killed and buried. It just didn't make sense.
But when Jesus invited him to see for himself that He really was alive after that horrendous death, Thomas' exclamation could not be more emphatic--he was shocked into the "impossible" reality of Jesus' Resurrection.
Sometimes God uses a very dramatic episode of experience as He did here with Thomas, and with Saul of Tarsis on the road to Damascus (Acts 9:3-6).
And as He did with me, as He showed me Jesus on the Cross, and I knew He took my place in death because He didn't deserve it and I did. That's when He performed the miracle of New Birth in me, and my whole life turned around; as Saul's did in becoming Paul, and as He does for everyone who is born into God's family.
So whether you had a dramatic moment of conversion, or if your faith in believing that Jesus was your personal Sacrifice grew gently over time, your relationship with your Father in Heaven is just as personal and individual as you are.
Jesus didn't approach everyone the same way, He knew who each person was and where they were coming from, so He varied His approach with each one. Consider the round-about way He talked to the woman at the well in Samaria (John 4:6-26) as compared with the direct approach He used with Nicodemus (John 3:1-3).
God knows us. He knows all the differences He built into each of us, and He knows our common needs. He knows we are all broken, that's why He sent His Son. And Jesus showed us what God is like: gentle and firm, compassionate and just, fair and treating us all individually.
And He calls all of us to recognize Who He is, what He has done, and how much He loves us.
But most do not want to know Him. They would rather consider themselves their own persons, their own judges, their own gods to decide for themselves. Because God gave them His intelligence and creativity, they have allowed the enemy to convince them that they don't have to listen to anyone else, they can make their own decisions. And these people end up fighting against the very Good they are looking for in life, and will have destroyed themselves in the process.
Yet our Creator still loves everything and everyone He made. He makes possible the way to escape destruction, in opening the door to everyone to come to Him.
I was one who fought against Him. I thought I had been "good enough" to save myself. Then I got off that road and began to try to satisfy my own desires in very unrighteous ways. I see that now as God allowing me to see that I couldn't save myself.
Because God chose to draw me to Himself this way convinces me that He can draw anyone He wants to draw. I was searching for Truth, though. I didn't know that Jesus is the Truth.
Are you looking for something in life, and not realizing that it is God you're looking for?
Even so, come, Lord Jesus!
