Have you ever misjudged someone you met for the first time, only to find out later just how wrong you were in your first impression of them? Unfortunately, in the case of a bad first impression, the first impression tends to be the lasting impression. But it does not always have to be that way. We can also make the same mistake with God. Perhaps your first impression of God was less than a good impression based either on bad theology, heretical teaching, or mistaken impressions from what other people have incorrectly said about God. So, what first and lasting impression does God make on us in how He describes Himself to us? In Psalm 103, we read Davd’s description of the LORD (Heb. Yahweh, self-existent) as being, “compassionate and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in lovingkindness.” This description is not original with David but is a restating of God’s own self-revelation to Moses on Mt. Sinai around 450 years earlier (cf. Exodus 34:6). The significance of this description lies in the fact that this is how God describes Himself. In God’s self-revelation, He describes Himself as possessing the attributes of being compassionate, gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in lovingkindness. These attributes of God correspond to the reality that He does not always strive with us nor retain His anger forever. He does not treat us according to our sins or
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