GOD IS EASY TO LIVE WITH

“Satan‘s first attack upon the human race was his sly effort to destroy Eve’s confidence in the kindness of God... from a failure properly to understand God comes the world of unhappiness among good Christians…, the Christian life has been thought to be glum, a cross-carrying under the stern eye of a Father who expects much and excuses nothing.”

I was the last born in the Wilkerson family of five siblings. I consider that being very fortunate for me to be the last born. Our parents’ form of Pentecostal Christianity was that of our church and thus our parents were committed to making “the strait and narrow way” much narrower than God intended. My older siblings accused me of being spoiled but that was due to the fact that, when I came along, Mother and Dad had shed some of their legalism. By the time I was a senior in high school, I began to quietly break some of their unscriptural rules for living. I left home one day, without telling my parents, to go to an amusement park, knowing I’d never be given permission to do so. I got quite a scolding from my father as a result when I got home.

I then went off to a Bible Training School where the same type of legalism was enforced. It was then that I discovered the writings of A.W. Tozer. The first book of his I read was entitled The Root of the Righteous.

In that book is a chapter entitled God Is Easy to Live With. As I read it, I said, “Finally here is the Christianity I want to embrace.” (All quotes here are from Tozer mentioned titles.)

Tozer goes on to write: “The fellowship of God is delightful beyond all telling. He communes with his redeemed ones in an easy, uninhibited fellowship that is restful and healing. He is quick to mark every simple effort to please Him, and just as quick to overlook imperfections when He knows we meant to do His will. He loves us for ourselves and values our love more than galaxies of newly created worlds. Unfortunately, many Christians cannot get free from their perverted notions of God, and these notions poison their hearts and destroy their inward freedom. These friends serve God grimly, as the elder brother did, doing what is right without enthusiasm and without joy, and seem altogether unable to understand the buoyant, spirited celebration when the prodigal comes home.... How good it would be if we could learn that God is easy to live with. He remembers our frames and knows we’re dust. He was sometimes chasing us, it is true, but even that it is, He does with a smile, the proud, tender smile of a Father, who is bursting with pleasure over an imperfect but promising son who is coming every day to look more and more like the One whose child he is.”

After reading Tozer, certain scriptures I had either passed over or ignored jumped right off the pages of the Bible and ministered to this student training for the ministry. I went from a law-based understanding of the Christian life to a grace-based spiritual journey. Two verses became a part of my newfound relationship with my Lord: “My yoke is easy, and My burden is light” (Matthew 11:30).

And the previous verse, Matthew 11:29, which says, “Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.” 

May you find the same rest!

Don Wilkerson

President Emeritus

Teen Challenge, Inc