I recently had a friend almost die in my arms. It was a frightening experience. We were out for lunch with friends enjoying a nice meal and in the middle of lunch he got up from the table, took a few steps, and then slowly fell to the floor. I grabbed him in my arms as he was losing consciousness and while I was holding him, his breathing stopped. In a matter of seconds his moving, breathing body went lifeless. Less than a minute later, his once lifeless body started to breath again. Thanks to God, he’s alive today.

To be immediately cut off from someone in a matter of seconds is heartbreaking. Cut off from your friendship, your bond and your relationship can be devastating. I felt that sense of loss in the moments I held my friend’s lifeless body in my arms.

From the very beginning, when God created the earth and everything in it, He purposefully intended to never cut Himself off from us.

He was also deliberate in how we would know about Him throughout the generations. How He would create a timeless legacy and report the historical events so you and I could discover and know about a God who never wants to be cut off from someone He loves—that’s you and I.

One simple way He did this was through the Word of God—the Bible.

Simply, God gave us His Word so we wouldn’t feel cut off from Him. He uses His Word to tell stories to us. Stories of how His continual pursuit of a relationship with us is unceasing. How His story is a tapestry of events and encounters to display for the entire world how He continues to move toward us, despite us. He loved us first, even before we took a breath.

“Even before he made the world, God loved us and chose us in Christ to be holy and without fault in his eyes.” Ephesians 1:4

Life is found in God and God alone. When we try creating a life separate from Him we fill it with lifeless objects. In time, we realize how empty that life is or how shallow it has become. Something is missing and the life we desire to have is not there—and the cause is a broken relationship. Without restoring that relationship we eventually end up in a lifeless state, dead.

God breathed life into us when He formed us. He breathed life into His Word, so that as we read it, that breath would never stop having its impact on us. As we read His Word, it’s like God putting life into a body in need of oxygen.

A famous man in the Bible named Job had everything stripped away from him: his family, his possessions and his health. After this awakening event, he came to the awareness that his breathing existence is, and only, from God; and life can be summed up as a breath. In the end, everything he had and even more was restored to him, but it was through that experience Job learned that in God’s hand is the life of every living thing and the breath of all mankind. The balance of life is held in the very palm of God.

“For the life of every living thing is in his hand, and the breath of ever human being.” Job 12:10

Recognizing where hope and life exists is a discovery moment for all of us to eventually one day encounter. To know where this life comes from and to follow Him is what will change everything.

We are lifeless without His breath. The Word of God is life – it gives life and it is written to us from the Author of life.

May you find hope in His breath today and may He breathe upon you His everlasting hope.

 

Peter Marshall is the President of The Gideons International in Canada & ShareWord Global. He is a Visionary Leader who is passionate about spreading The Gospel all over the world!