We must define God positively. He is a person. Many people always wish to define God by what he is not.
You cannot define a person by what they are not. A person is a positive entity and must be defined positively.
At times statements about what a person is not can help clarify a person. But negative statements are far less useful in defining a person than positive statements.
The bible offers a great deal of positive statements about God. We always need to grasp the positive teaching on the nature of God. This gets us much closer to understanding God than negative statements of what God is not.
In fact God walked among us in the person of Jesus who took on human flesh. We can learn much about the nature of God from looking at the life of Jesus presented in the gospels.
Of course we must really read the gospels rather than what those who do not read the gospels think they say or those who pick and choose what they like from the gospels.
Jesus was a person very concerned with heaven and hell. He did repeatedly declare his divinity and call men to himself.
He was a man who turned the other cheek, but also a man who stood up and fought injustice. You see God's nature is more complex than ours. His personhood is deeper and richer than ours because he is bigger than us.
It is why so many people get God wrong. They cannot understand a righteous anger or a God who judges but does not delight in judgement. We need to learn as we see God what true personhood of the deepest kind looks like.
Showing posts with label hell. Show all posts
Showing posts with label hell. Show all posts
Friday, May 30, 2014
Tuesday, January 28, 2014
The End and Now
Often we see in life people ponder how they would have changed things if they knew how things would have turned out. At the end the see the result of actions which have happened and they wonder what they would have changed.
Obviously each of us has an end and to some degree each end seems unique. But it is a bit illusory. You see there are only 2 main ends. Life and Death. Heaven and hell.
Some people laugh and it is all too easy to dismiss. It seems too simple really at times. Always we should take another look at the simplicity of Christianity.
You see all of man’s thinking has not really solved the darkness in man. Man is who the bible says he is in an unmistakable sense if he is really honest about it. He is the man the bible describes and he is in need of what Jesus through the cross has to offer.
Obviously each of us has an end and to some degree each end seems unique. But it is a bit illusory. You see there are only 2 main ends. Life and Death. Heaven and hell.
Some people laugh and it is all too easy to dismiss. It seems too simple really at times. Always we should take another look at the simplicity of Christianity.
You see all of man’s thinking has not really solved the darkness in man. Man is who the bible says he is in an unmistakable sense if he is really honest about it. He is the man the bible describes and he is in need of what Jesus through the cross has to offer.
Sunday, November 24, 2013
To understand Sin
The modern church at least in American has never really gotten the grasp of sin. Everywhere well-meaning Christians are greatly concerned that not all will be saved.
It is not fair that there will be those who are not saved. It is as if it is fair for us to be saved.
Strangely we haven't grasped the concept of sin. You see what is fair is hell and condemnation. There is a sense in which those who are saved have had something unfair happen.
The saved have had and will have something fair happen in a sense. That is heaven but you see it is what Jesus deserves not what they deserve.
The Christian through union with Christ gets what Jesus' perfect life and perfect obedience to death deserved heaven. And Jesus got what we deserved on the cross - of course as God the grave good not hold him.
You see we are so concerned with what is fair but we have not even inquired of the bible what is fair. I suppose we do not like the explanation in the bible of what is fair so we ignore it.
I suppose we can always continue in this way ignoring what the bible says and imposing our ideas in the church. You see we think our ideas make missions important.
If we think this is nonsense. Really the concept of finality pushes missions and the sense of it really might not be so bad because we do not want to think of God in this way impends missions.
The bible gives a clear picture of God and it is God as he wishes to be viewed. He wishes to be viewed as gentle and tender as a lamb lead to the slaughter and he also wants to be viewed as the lion of Judah.
You see God shows himself in many ways. In a gentile wind, in a small voice, in a flood of enormous proportions, in the sending of plagues, and the care of the poor and sick.
You see people often try to redact scripture or draw a dichotomy between the God of the Old Testament and the God of the New Testament as if they are different.
But Jesus spoke more of hell than heaven and his whole life as he spoke of it was predicated that he had a work to be done. The reality is that God is larger than we are and more complex than we are.
Our personhood is so small we cannot grasp the degree of his personhood. Sometimes we get a glimpse of the strangeness of emotion.
Maybe a friend gets a great opportunity in a place far away. We have sadness and joy mixed together. Emotion on top of emotion and emotion which seems contradictory.
You see if is right to feel many emotions about the same event at times. We draw lines in the sand between emotions and sharp contrast. This is because we are small and cannot understand what it means for example to have anger and compassion at the same time.
It is not fair that there will be those who are not saved. It is as if it is fair for us to be saved.
Strangely we haven't grasped the concept of sin. You see what is fair is hell and condemnation. There is a sense in which those who are saved have had something unfair happen.
The saved have had and will have something fair happen in a sense. That is heaven but you see it is what Jesus deserves not what they deserve.
The Christian through union with Christ gets what Jesus' perfect life and perfect obedience to death deserved heaven. And Jesus got what we deserved on the cross - of course as God the grave good not hold him.
You see we are so concerned with what is fair but we have not even inquired of the bible what is fair. I suppose we do not like the explanation in the bible of what is fair so we ignore it.
I suppose we can always continue in this way ignoring what the bible says and imposing our ideas in the church. You see we think our ideas make missions important.
If we think this is nonsense. Really the concept of finality pushes missions and the sense of it really might not be so bad because we do not want to think of God in this way impends missions.
The bible gives a clear picture of God and it is God as he wishes to be viewed. He wishes to be viewed as gentle and tender as a lamb lead to the slaughter and he also wants to be viewed as the lion of Judah.
You see God shows himself in many ways. In a gentile wind, in a small voice, in a flood of enormous proportions, in the sending of plagues, and the care of the poor and sick.
You see people often try to redact scripture or draw a dichotomy between the God of the Old Testament and the God of the New Testament as if they are different.
But Jesus spoke more of hell than heaven and his whole life as he spoke of it was predicated that he had a work to be done. The reality is that God is larger than we are and more complex than we are.
Our personhood is so small we cannot grasp the degree of his personhood. Sometimes we get a glimpse of the strangeness of emotion.
Maybe a friend gets a great opportunity in a place far away. We have sadness and joy mixed together. Emotion on top of emotion and emotion which seems contradictory.
You see if is right to feel many emotions about the same event at times. We draw lines in the sand between emotions and sharp contrast. This is because we are small and cannot understand what it means for example to have anger and compassion at the same time.
Saturday, April 20, 2013
The Hypocrisy of Preaching Following Jesus while Rejecting His Teaching
There are a number of modern preachers questioning if the Christian God
would really will a place such as hell. Yet they wish for us to
follow Christ...
Jesus spoke of heaven and hell. To follow Jesus is to sit under the man's teaching. One is not a disciple of Jesus if one stands over his teaching.
Of course Jesus speaks of hell in a new light that he has come to break its power over those who will trust in him. Why the cross is necessary is to save a few from judgment.
A God of love could not ordain hell many modern preachers say. The reality is that these preachers do not understand the love of a God who would bring people to himself at such great cost.
Why is the cross necessary? It is because in our natural state we will surely parish if we glimpsed God. It is only clothed in Christ's righteousness that we can possibly even approach the Living God.
Jesus spoke of heaven and hell. To follow Jesus is to sit under the man's teaching. One is not a disciple of Jesus if one stands over his teaching.
Of course Jesus speaks of hell in a new light that he has come to break its power over those who will trust in him. Why the cross is necessary is to save a few from judgment.
A God of love could not ordain hell many modern preachers say. The reality is that these preachers do not understand the love of a God who would bring people to himself at such great cost.
Why is the cross necessary? It is because in our natural state we will surely parish if we glimpsed God. It is only clothed in Christ's righteousness that we can possibly even approach the Living God.
Thursday, April 11, 2013
Relation of Tenderness and Severity
Today in the Church (at least in the USA) there is a great tendency toward displaying the elements of Jesus’ life which are gentile, kind, and tender. The Church has created a false Jesus who never existed, not because Jesus was not exemplary of these traits, but because Jesus was far more than these things.
The great error in the modern church is to fail to see the Jesus who confronted evil in his day with difficult and harsh (but true) statements. One scene never preached on in the modern day is Jesus driving those defiling the temple away with whips.
Of course the Jesus in the New Testament should not surprise us since the old testament revelation had always portrayed God’s righteous anger against sin.
Maybe the issue the Church faces today is that it has lost the idea that there is an anger which is righteous. The two it seems in the church are held antithetically at all times.
The bible speaks very harshly against most anger, but there is anger which comes from faith. The anger from faith acts in a way to protect the downtrodden and lost in the world. The church today has not come to terms with Jesus since it has failed to understand the complexity of human emotion.
Since the church has lost the concept of the wrath of God against evil. It is not surprising that it is also struggling with the Bible's very clear teaching on heaven and hell.
The great error in the modern church is to fail to see the Jesus who confronted evil in his day with difficult and harsh (but true) statements. One scene never preached on in the modern day is Jesus driving those defiling the temple away with whips.
Of course the Jesus in the New Testament should not surprise us since the old testament revelation had always portrayed God’s righteous anger against sin.
Maybe the issue the Church faces today is that it has lost the idea that there is an anger which is righteous. The two it seems in the church are held antithetically at all times.
The bible speaks very harshly against most anger, but there is anger which comes from faith. The anger from faith acts in a way to protect the downtrodden and lost in the world. The church today has not come to terms with Jesus since it has failed to understand the complexity of human emotion.
Since the church has lost the concept of the wrath of God against evil. It is not surprising that it is also struggling with the Bible's very clear teaching on heaven and hell.
Sunday, November 1, 2009
Missions
“You have three possibilities in relation to missions. You can be a goer, you can be a sender, or you can be disobedient.” – John Piper
Jesus asks the church to go out and make disciples of every tribe and nation. If we think we can opt-out of the great commission we are being disobedient.
If we seriously take the bibles teachings on heaven and hell seriously how can we not feel compassion enough to either be a goer or sender for missions?
A lot of people act casually about the Gospel as if God does not have a will that it be spread. Or they assume it is somehow their churches job only to spread the gospel as if they are not part of the process.
We all have opportunities around us. If we are looking. Of course we will only look for opportunities if we wish to be faithful to God.
Often people see no opportunities, but the reality is they have closed themselves off the the will of God. God has opportunities for those who wish to live by faith.
Jesus asks the church to go out and make disciples of every tribe and nation. If we think we can opt-out of the great commission we are being disobedient.
If we seriously take the bibles teachings on heaven and hell seriously how can we not feel compassion enough to either be a goer or sender for missions?
A lot of people act casually about the Gospel as if God does not have a will that it be spread. Or they assume it is somehow their churches job only to spread the gospel as if they are not part of the process.
We all have opportunities around us. If we are looking. Of course we will only look for opportunities if we wish to be faithful to God.
Often people see no opportunities, but the reality is they have closed themselves off the the will of God. God has opportunities for those who wish to live by faith.
Saturday, June 25, 2005
What We Deserve
It does not surprise me in the least that non-Christians often feel like they deserve better than what they are getting. But, I am constantly surprised by how Christians (including myself) often feel like we are getting less than we deserve. What we deserve is this:
No matter what the Lord gives to us, surely it is better than what we deserve.
Rev. 14:10-11: He, too, will drink of the wine of God's fury, which has been poured full strength into the cup of his wrath. He will be tormented with burning sulfur in the presence of the holy angels and of the Lamb. And the smoke of their torment rises for ever and ever. There is no rest day or night for those who worship the beast and his image, or for anyone who receives the mark of his name.
No matter what the Lord gives to us, surely it is better than what we deserve.
Wednesday, May 11, 2005
Hell
Another interesting (and truly scary bit) from John Piper:
Mark 9:47-49: "And if your eye causes you to sin, pluck it out. It is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than to have two eyes and be thrown into hell, where 'their worm does not die, and the fire is not quenched.' Everyone will be salted with fire."
People often respond that fire is just a metaphor.
But why do we use metaphors?
Because we lack adequate language to describe the reality.
Thus hell is at least as bad if not more so than fire for all of eternity.
And then Piper quoted C.S. Lewis which I will paraphrase as follows: "It is more important that one man be saved than that all the classics ever written were saved from destruction."
And you know Lewis has a much higher view of the classics than most anyone. :)
Mark 9:47-49: "And if your eye causes you to sin, pluck it out. It is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than to have two eyes and be thrown into hell, where 'their worm does not die, and the fire is not quenched.' Everyone will be salted with fire."
People often respond that fire is just a metaphor.
But why do we use metaphors?
Because we lack adequate language to describe the reality.
Thus hell is at least as bad if not more so than fire for all of eternity.
And then Piper quoted C.S. Lewis which I will paraphrase as follows: "It is more important that one man be saved than that all the classics ever written were saved from destruction."
And you know Lewis has a much higher view of the classics than most anyone. :)
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