Sweet Encounter at Peet's

I was sitting at Peet's today, just reading a book I had picked up a while ago that picks out 100 great verses in the Bible and gives a little blurb about each one. I asked a woman if I could sit next to her since there weren't any other seats around, and she invited me to sit. As soon as I did, she asked me what I was reading. I began to explain to her what it was about, and she went on to ask me all kinds of questions about God. Things like "What makes those verses important?" "I have heard God is relational, how is that?" and "How do you define God?". She apologized for asking so many questions, but I really was challenged by our conversation and told her that I welcome any questions she has. It's good to have my thoughts challenged!

How do you even begin to describe God? I tried my best to describe different aspects of God, but after each attempted, she asked again, "so, how do you define God?" The best response I came up with (finally), is that the concept of God is just to big for us to try to define in human terms. Like there are many different names used in the Bible for God, we can only try to explain the different attributes of God. Collectively, they give us an idea of who He is, but there is no one, concise definition. It depends on how you're looking at God at that moment. Another way I used to explain it was if you tried to explain who a woman was. She is a daughter, a mother, a wife, a sister, a worker, a friend - it all depends on the context you are viewing her. The same goes for God.

It was just so cool for me to experience that. Having no intention of talking to this woman, she asked ME about God. It makes me wish that I had better words to describe what a relationship with God looks like. I guess that's up to the Holy Spirit though - to speak through me the words that she needed to hear. There was no saving prayer, but I definitely felt that I planted a good seed. And I believe that God uses those seeds planted by different people to build up a desire to know more - which will lead to saving grace. I'm just a part of his greater plan! It also makes me want to just dig into the Bible, in order to have those verses on the tip of my tongue to share with other people. I can only say so much to try to explain in my own words.