(No date)
God is okay. Jesus isn’t, at least according to network television.
While surfing channels, I happened upon a popular woman’s show on a major network. One woman was telling a group of women how she had been on another network show and as she was describing her recent weight loss, she blurted, “Thank you, Jesus.” To her astonishment, those words were cut from the final broadcast.
Another woman (this was not a religious program) said she often makes her faith public, and seldom receives flack for it. The others felt the first case was more typical than the second. Apparently you can mention faith in God on television, but not faith in Jesus.
Those who think Jesus was a benevolent do-gooder and a wise teacher, will not acknowledge His deity. They might cry a “thank you” to God or pray to Him if they are in trouble, but the name of Jesus is more often a cuss word. Why? They do not believe Jesus is God.
Jesus Himself encountered those kinds of people. When certain religious leaders challenged what He was doing and who He was, He replied, “You do not know me or my Father. If you knew me, you would know my Father also. . . . If God were your Father, you would love me, for I came from God. . . . I and the Father are one” (from John 8 & 10). With that, they understood He claimed to be God, so they picked up stones to try and kill Him.
For a while, Jesus’ disciples were also unsure of who He was. Philip asked, “Lord, show us the Father and that will be enough for us.” Jesus replied, “Don’t you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father. . . . Believe me when I say that I am in the Father and the Father is in me.”
In same conversation, Jesus said, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you really knew me, you would know my Father also.”
According to Jesus, God is approachable only one way. A personal relationship with the Father is impossible without going through the Son, and acknowledging Him.
However, acknowledging Jesus Christ goes far beyond saying He was a good man and a wise teacher. Even a brief examination of His life shows He was far more; He healed the sick, cast out demons, controlled the weather, turned water to wine, did things only God can do.
Yet few avoid Jesus because of His power. Instead, they are offended by the purpose of His death. He came to die for our sins, sins that we are reluctant to admit or abandon. If we are going to acknowledge Jesus, we must acknowledge our sin and our need for forgiveness. He came, not to help us shed extra pounds but to satisfy the wrath of God against sin and to remove the burden of our sin and the weight of our guilt.
So if we mention Jesus, at least where this gospel message is rejected, and those who do not care to admit their sin will start throwing rocks. For them, God is okay because they assume He can be kept at arms length.
Actually, He is not even that close. Isaiah said “God’s arm is not too short to save, nor his ear too dull to hear, but your iniquities have separated you from your God; your sins have hidden his face from you, so that he will not hear.”
The woman on the talk show admitted that she didn’t realize what she was saying. It appears “popular” to pop off a “Thank you, Jesus” even without acknowledging sin or having a personal relationship with Him. Yet she discovered something; when an effort to be popular by acting religious is pitted against a determination to avoid Christ, that resistance will win — and immediately try to erase all mention of His name.
Showing posts with label Jesus is God in human flesh. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Jesus is God in human flesh. Show all posts
Monday, June 18, 2018
Monday, June 11, 2018
The mystery of Jesus Christ ............. Parables 753
May 28, 2002
About thirty years ago, I read a book whose author assumed people were getting smarter and smarter. Therefore, gods from other planets must have once invaded earth. They gave wisdom to the people who built the pyramids and other wonders. Then I read another book that suggested people were recycled from one life form to another. At the same time, I was thinking about my dad’s theory about energy. He said it was not created or destroyed, just changed from one form to another.
These books plus my dad’s theory had me thinking: Did gods ever come to earth? What would happen to me after I died? Were these ideas somehow connected? It did not occur to me that God was setting me up.
The book about reincarnation had a Bible verse in it. It was taken out of its normal context, but as I read, God spoke to me. His voice was not audible, but just as you know the voice of your mother or your child, I knew it was God speaking. He said: “Jesus is God.”
At that moment, the room became brighter, and so did the dark, confusing things in my life. Every part of me knew it was true and at that instant, I knew Jesus. I also wanted to live for Him.
Later, I found out that many people take issue with that statement: “Jesus is God.” Some think Jesus was only a good teacher or a prophet. Others are confused — if there is one God, how can He be a trinity, which must be three gods?
I don’t have a problem with the concept of a triune God. He created the very elements of the world in a triune form. Even H2O illustrates the trinity—it can be steam, water, or ice. Each is radically different in appearance and other distinctives, yet all three are the same H2O.
For me, the dual nature of Jesus Christ is more difficult to understand. The Bible says Christ is both human and divine. He is God but He is also man. How can that be? As a human, Jesus looked like an ordinary man. Isaiah said, “He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him, nothing in his appearance that we should desire him” (Isaiah 53:2). He also became hungry, thirsty and tired, just as we do.
Yet Jesus did things no man has ever done. He healed the sick with a word or a touch, turned water to wine, calmed storms, knew peoples’ minds, walked on water, raised the dead to life. A Roman soldier said of Him, “No one ever spoke the way this man does” (John 7:46). How can a man be both human and God?
Shirley McLaine thinks she has the answer. She says it is normal—and claims that she is God. She must not realize that statement parallels the original lie Satan used to tempt Eve in the garden of Eden? (“If you eat the fruit, you will be like God.”) Such audacity. We have yet to see Ms. McLaine prove it as Jesus did, by doing the things only God can do.
Despite her bold claim, we cannot grasp the dual nature of Jesus that way. If we honestly compare ourselves as humans with the God who revealed Himself as a human, how can we dare say we are Him or even like Him? Jesus sets the standard. His life was pure and holy. Our human life is nothing like that.
We cannot find fault with the man Jesus. He simply did not sin. He never violated the laws of God. He became hungry and tired, but He never put His personal needs before the needs of others. He sacrificed time and energy to bless people, and, after an amazing, short ministry, He made the ultimate sacrifice; He gave Himself as a sin offering to God as our substitute. No human being would or could do that.
Yet God makes a relationship with Jesus possible. He offers forgiveness of sin and salvation through Him. When we believe, Jesus comes to live in our hearts. The Bible calls it: “this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.”
With faith, we can become, in a sense, a model of what He is. We fall short in our humanness (we are not perfect), and we are not God, yet we can share in His life. When we know Him as our Lord and Savior, He gives us at least a small glimpse into the mystery of who He is.
About thirty years ago, I read a book whose author assumed people were getting smarter and smarter. Therefore, gods from other planets must have once invaded earth. They gave wisdom to the people who built the pyramids and other wonders. Then I read another book that suggested people were recycled from one life form to another. At the same time, I was thinking about my dad’s theory about energy. He said it was not created or destroyed, just changed from one form to another.
These books plus my dad’s theory had me thinking: Did gods ever come to earth? What would happen to me after I died? Were these ideas somehow connected? It did not occur to me that God was setting me up.
The book about reincarnation had a Bible verse in it. It was taken out of its normal context, but as I read, God spoke to me. His voice was not audible, but just as you know the voice of your mother or your child, I knew it was God speaking. He said: “Jesus is God.”
At that moment, the room became brighter, and so did the dark, confusing things in my life. Every part of me knew it was true and at that instant, I knew Jesus. I also wanted to live for Him.
Later, I found out that many people take issue with that statement: “Jesus is God.” Some think Jesus was only a good teacher or a prophet. Others are confused — if there is one God, how can He be a trinity, which must be three gods?
I don’t have a problem with the concept of a triune God. He created the very elements of the world in a triune form. Even H2O illustrates the trinity—it can be steam, water, or ice. Each is radically different in appearance and other distinctives, yet all three are the same H2O.
For me, the dual nature of Jesus Christ is more difficult to understand. The Bible says Christ is both human and divine. He is God but He is also man. How can that be? As a human, Jesus looked like an ordinary man. Isaiah said, “He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him, nothing in his appearance that we should desire him” (Isaiah 53:2). He also became hungry, thirsty and tired, just as we do.
Yet Jesus did things no man has ever done. He healed the sick with a word or a touch, turned water to wine, calmed storms, knew peoples’ minds, walked on water, raised the dead to life. A Roman soldier said of Him, “No one ever spoke the way this man does” (John 7:46). How can a man be both human and God?
Shirley McLaine thinks she has the answer. She says it is normal—and claims that she is God. She must not realize that statement parallels the original lie Satan used to tempt Eve in the garden of Eden? (“If you eat the fruit, you will be like God.”) Such audacity. We have yet to see Ms. McLaine prove it as Jesus did, by doing the things only God can do.
Despite her bold claim, we cannot grasp the dual nature of Jesus that way. If we honestly compare ourselves as humans with the God who revealed Himself as a human, how can we dare say we are Him or even like Him? Jesus sets the standard. His life was pure and holy. Our human life is nothing like that.
We cannot find fault with the man Jesus. He simply did not sin. He never violated the laws of God. He became hungry and tired, but He never put His personal needs before the needs of others. He sacrificed time and energy to bless people, and, after an amazing, short ministry, He made the ultimate sacrifice; He gave Himself as a sin offering to God as our substitute. No human being would or could do that.
Yet God makes a relationship with Jesus possible. He offers forgiveness of sin and salvation through Him. When we believe, Jesus comes to live in our hearts. The Bible calls it: “this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.”
With faith, we can become, in a sense, a model of what He is. We fall short in our humanness (we are not perfect), and we are not God, yet we can share in His life. When we know Him as our Lord and Savior, He gives us at least a small glimpse into the mystery of who He is.
Wednesday, November 22, 2017
Understanding God .......... Parables 670
May 18, 2000
Millions of businesses use the Internet to advertise and sell products. Millions of ordinary folks use it to find information and to communicate with friends all over the world.
The Internet started as a convenience for government agencies. Soon other organizations saw its potential. Since the 1994 advent of Internet browsers, the number of web servers who feed information into cyberspace has exploded from a few thousand to over several million. They host uncountable personal and corporate web sites. With such rapid growth, no one has a handle on the actual size of the worldwide web. While most of us don’t care, some ambitious people are trying to draw a map of the Internet. They want to define and catalog it, somehow wrapping their minds around its size and content.
Imagine an even greater challenge: try to figure out God. The study is called “theology” and theology books are filled with finite human attempts to understand Someone infinite, Someone greater than the Internet or even the entire universe.
Theology tries to list God’s attributes and actions, dividing characteristics into those we can share — like mercy, and those that belong to God alone — such as the ability to know all things.
Theologians devote pages describing how God reveals Himself and how we can know Him. They describe and define His names and His triune nature. Some have perplexing titles such as “Essence and Attributes” and “Defenseless Superior Power.”
Besides chapters on His character, theologians describe the way God behaves. They talk of His mercy in sparing those who deserved judgment. They describe how He takes care of His people, sometimes in miraculous ways.
However, the best way to define God is the way He defines Himself. That is, what God is like is most clearly seen in His Son, Jesus Christ. Yes, Jesus was a human being. He was born just as we were, grew up, learned, and was subject to His parents and civil law. He got hungry, thirsty and tired. He was just like us in that He had feelings, thoughts, and choices to make.
However, if we study His life, it is not long before we realize He is not exactly like us, or rather, we are not exactly like Him. We make mistakes, talk out of turn, lose our temper, and get annoyed with people. We lose patience with our own sin and the sins of others. But Jesus said and did the right things — always. He reflects qualities that belong to God and God alone. If descriptions do not convince us that He is divine, Jesus also walked on water, healed the sick, turned water into wine, fed thousands with less than what is in my pantry, and raised the dead. He read minds and forgave sins. Only God can do that.
We may not understand words like immanent and eternal, but in Christ we can clearly see that God is loving and merciful. We can also see how He hates sin but cares deeply about sinners. That is, God pulled on humanity like a pair of pants and walked among us. He knew we could not grasp His nature by mere descriptions. He knew we would stumble if all we had were stories of His interaction with Old Testament Jews. Skeptics even discredit God and those miracles by saying they were superstition, coincidences or freaks of nature.
But no one can explain away Jesus. Real people saw, touched, and heard Him. They interacted with a living person who loved them and did miracles. They watched Him give Himself up to death on a cross for human sin. Over 500 of them rejoiced to see Him alive again when God raised Him from the dead. They knew He was God in the flesh.
By studying Jesus, we can begin to understand God as described in Scripture. By putting our faith in Him, we can experience God too. He will live within us and walk beside us. We never again have to struggle with long words and vague descriptions that always fall short because, in Christ, we can not only know who He is but we can know Him as our Savior and personal friend.
Millions of businesses use the Internet to advertise and sell products. Millions of ordinary folks use it to find information and to communicate with friends all over the world.
The Internet started as a convenience for government agencies. Soon other organizations saw its potential. Since the 1994 advent of Internet browsers, the number of web servers who feed information into cyberspace has exploded from a few thousand to over several million. They host uncountable personal and corporate web sites. With such rapid growth, no one has a handle on the actual size of the worldwide web. While most of us don’t care, some ambitious people are trying to draw a map of the Internet. They want to define and catalog it, somehow wrapping their minds around its size and content.
Imagine an even greater challenge: try to figure out God. The study is called “theology” and theology books are filled with finite human attempts to understand Someone infinite, Someone greater than the Internet or even the entire universe.
Theology tries to list God’s attributes and actions, dividing characteristics into those we can share — like mercy, and those that belong to God alone — such as the ability to know all things.
Theologians devote pages describing how God reveals Himself and how we can know Him. They describe and define His names and His triune nature. Some have perplexing titles such as “Essence and Attributes” and “Defenseless Superior Power.”
Besides chapters on His character, theologians describe the way God behaves. They talk of His mercy in sparing those who deserved judgment. They describe how He takes care of His people, sometimes in miraculous ways.
However, the best way to define God is the way He defines Himself. That is, what God is like is most clearly seen in His Son, Jesus Christ. Yes, Jesus was a human being. He was born just as we were, grew up, learned, and was subject to His parents and civil law. He got hungry, thirsty and tired. He was just like us in that He had feelings, thoughts, and choices to make.
However, if we study His life, it is not long before we realize He is not exactly like us, or rather, we are not exactly like Him. We make mistakes, talk out of turn, lose our temper, and get annoyed with people. We lose patience with our own sin and the sins of others. But Jesus said and did the right things — always. He reflects qualities that belong to God and God alone. If descriptions do not convince us that He is divine, Jesus also walked on water, healed the sick, turned water into wine, fed thousands with less than what is in my pantry, and raised the dead. He read minds and forgave sins. Only God can do that.
We may not understand words like immanent and eternal, but in Christ we can clearly see that God is loving and merciful. We can also see how He hates sin but cares deeply about sinners. That is, God pulled on humanity like a pair of pants and walked among us. He knew we could not grasp His nature by mere descriptions. He knew we would stumble if all we had were stories of His interaction with Old Testament Jews. Skeptics even discredit God and those miracles by saying they were superstition, coincidences or freaks of nature.
But no one can explain away Jesus. Real people saw, touched, and heard Him. They interacted with a living person who loved them and did miracles. They watched Him give Himself up to death on a cross for human sin. Over 500 of them rejoiced to see Him alive again when God raised Him from the dead. They knew He was God in the flesh.
By studying Jesus, we can begin to understand God as described in Scripture. By putting our faith in Him, we can experience God too. He will live within us and walk beside us. We never again have to struggle with long words and vague descriptions that always fall short because, in Christ, we can not only know who He is but we can know Him as our Savior and personal friend.
Monday, October 17, 2016
Where is God when life hurts? .......... Parables 498
January 2, 1996
A teenage girl is beaten by her dad and screams, “There is no God.” A purse snatcher robs a senior of her savings and she sobs, “There is no God.” A man befriends a young couple, convinces them to invest in his company, then disappears with their funds. They cling to each other and cry out there is no God.
Sometimes unthinking Christians respond to these tragedies with a line from Scripture that declares, “Only a fool says in his heart there is no God.” We don’t know what is in their heart. Perhaps a kinder and wiser option is speaking and living in a way that demonstrates to them that there is indeed a God.
People can do it. According to Genesis, God created us in His own image. In some ways we are like God. We are not reflections of His physical likeness (He is spirit) and we cannot be everywhere at once nor do all things. We are like Him in our creativity, emotions, capacity to think, to love and to make decisions. Also, He intended we reflect something of His wisdom, goodness and generosity. He created us so we would magnify His glory.
It is not that people are blind to God’s glory from other revelations. The psalmist says, “The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of His hands.” Nature reveals God’s power and creativity. If cats and dogs and grass and thunderstorms can declare the glory of God, why can’t humans?
God also revealed Himself to the prophets of old. They recorded in books what He showed and told them — compiled into what we call the Bible. Scripture is a written record of everything God has revealed about Himself. Reading its pages with an open mind opens our eyes to the truth of Who He is. If we can see God in a book, why can’t we see Him in each other?
The point is, whether people believe in God or not, all are image-bearers — but not all are doing the job. The mirror is dirty. God’s image is muddied by abuse, greed, power trips, stealing, extortion, adultery, gossip, hatred, murder, jealousy and selfishness. When we look at the downside of humanity, we are almost justified in saying, “There is no God.”
Even if we take an honest look at the positive or good things people do, we have to admit the goodness in people points to a higher good. Yet we fail there too. We prefer to give ourselves credit for our goodness. In doing so, we contribute to the notion that there is no God.
With all those ways we mar the image of God, I am glad God gave a greater revelation of Himself: “In the past God spoke to our forefathers through the prophets at many times and in various ways, but in these last days He has spoken to us by His Son... the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of His being....”
The Lord Jesus Christ is God’s perfect revelation of His love and holiness. As He said, “He who sees me sees the Father.” Yet take note, God chose to reveal Himself in a human being. Jesus needed sleep, food and drink and was tempted by sin just as we are. He had all the limitations of being human but was different in that He did not sin. He proved that sin is not essential to being human because it was in being human that Jesus accomplished what we fail to do. He perfectly reflected the image of God.
Through this remarkable God-man, we are offered forgiveness and cleansing of our sin. He can polish our mirror and restore the image of God in us.
Everyone, including people who suffer and those who torment them, need to see that God indeed exists. The compelling evidence may not be a lecture, sermon or thunderstorm. They might see Him in someone who thinks, talks, and acts like Jesus.
A teenage girl is beaten by her dad and screams, “There is no God.” A purse snatcher robs a senior of her savings and she sobs, “There is no God.” A man befriends a young couple, convinces them to invest in his company, then disappears with their funds. They cling to each other and cry out there is no God.
Sometimes unthinking Christians respond to these tragedies with a line from Scripture that declares, “Only a fool says in his heart there is no God.” We don’t know what is in their heart. Perhaps a kinder and wiser option is speaking and living in a way that demonstrates to them that there is indeed a God.
People can do it. According to Genesis, God created us in His own image. In some ways we are like God. We are not reflections of His physical likeness (He is spirit) and we cannot be everywhere at once nor do all things. We are like Him in our creativity, emotions, capacity to think, to love and to make decisions. Also, He intended we reflect something of His wisdom, goodness and generosity. He created us so we would magnify His glory.
It is not that people are blind to God’s glory from other revelations. The psalmist says, “The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of His hands.” Nature reveals God’s power and creativity. If cats and dogs and grass and thunderstorms can declare the glory of God, why can’t humans?
God also revealed Himself to the prophets of old. They recorded in books what He showed and told them — compiled into what we call the Bible. Scripture is a written record of everything God has revealed about Himself. Reading its pages with an open mind opens our eyes to the truth of Who He is. If we can see God in a book, why can’t we see Him in each other?
The point is, whether people believe in God or not, all are image-bearers — but not all are doing the job. The mirror is dirty. God’s image is muddied by abuse, greed, power trips, stealing, extortion, adultery, gossip, hatred, murder, jealousy and selfishness. When we look at the downside of humanity, we are almost justified in saying, “There is no God.”
Even if we take an honest look at the positive or good things people do, we have to admit the goodness in people points to a higher good. Yet we fail there too. We prefer to give ourselves credit for our goodness. In doing so, we contribute to the notion that there is no God.
With all those ways we mar the image of God, I am glad God gave a greater revelation of Himself: “In the past God spoke to our forefathers through the prophets at many times and in various ways, but in these last days He has spoken to us by His Son... the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of His being....”
The Lord Jesus Christ is God’s perfect revelation of His love and holiness. As He said, “He who sees me sees the Father.” Yet take note, God chose to reveal Himself in a human being. Jesus needed sleep, food and drink and was tempted by sin just as we are. He had all the limitations of being human but was different in that He did not sin. He proved that sin is not essential to being human because it was in being human that Jesus accomplished what we fail to do. He perfectly reflected the image of God.
Through this remarkable God-man, we are offered forgiveness and cleansing of our sin. He can polish our mirror and restore the image of God in us.
Everyone, including people who suffer and those who torment them, need to see that God indeed exists. The compelling evidence may not be a lecture, sermon or thunderstorm. They might see Him in someone who thinks, talks, and acts like Jesus.
Wednesday, January 27, 2016
How to See God ............. Parables 385
August 31, 1993
American astronauts, at least a few of them, have said that the view from “up there” makes it difficult not to believe in God.
Whoever thinks God is merely a figment of human imagination find such statements quite frustrating. There is no solid evidence, they say, and they are right, no one can actually prove God exists. However, the Bible makes no argument about the existence of God. Those who wrote it claim God revealed Himself in several ways, outlines those, and leaves believing it up to the critical observer.
It might be that those who say God is only found in our imagination have too high an opinion of human creativity. Instead of looking inside our imagination to discover where the idea of God came from, they ought to turn their eyes elsewhere. Psalm 19 says: “The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of His hands.”
Astronauts aside, an objective observer does not have to rocket into outer space to see creation’s mysteries. Many things right under our feet and noses have no explanation other than they were fashioned by an intelligent Someone.
The Bible itself is another way God reveals Himself. He spoke to “holy men” who recorded what He said. This book spans several thousand years of history, was written by 40 or so people, and presents a unified message about God. If these people merely imagined Him, it is odd so diverse a group would agree on even one of His characteristics, let alone all of them.
A third way, not as reliable as the first two, is that God reveals Himself through people. We are made in His image and have some capacity to demonstrate something of His goodness. The downside is that everyone is also prone to disobedience and resisting God. This conflicting capacity to demonstrate evil is not of God or even like Him, but how do we know God is not evil? Nature sometimes seems that way, at least if we look at tornadoes, floods, vicious animals and aggravations like weeds and mosquitoes. Some even think the Bible portrays God as an evil entity, full of wrath and vengeance, who destroys whole families and nations and sends fire from heaven on those who dare to shake their fist in His face.
For the answer, we need to look at the last and most perfect revelation of God: Jesus Christ. The Bible says He “is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of His being . . . .” (Hebrews 1:3)
Jesus Christ is God putting on human flesh, God loving mankind, God willing to share in our humanness and suffer for our sins, dying that we might live forever. We see God’s compassion and power in Jesus. He heals the sick, comforts the hurting, and forgives repentant sinners. Both God’s holy wrath and loving mercy are seen in Jesus who expressed hatred for sin and hypocrisy, yet wept over the unbelief that kept people from recognizing who He was.
My pastor says, “The non-verbal world speaks a language everyone can understand.” Romans 1 puts it like this: “What may be known about God is plain . . . because God has made it plain to them. For since the creation of the world, God’s invisible qualities His eternal power and divine nature have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.”
God is not hiding.
American astronauts, at least a few of them, have said that the view from “up there” makes it difficult not to believe in God.
Whoever thinks God is merely a figment of human imagination find such statements quite frustrating. There is no solid evidence, they say, and they are right, no one can actually prove God exists. However, the Bible makes no argument about the existence of God. Those who wrote it claim God revealed Himself in several ways, outlines those, and leaves believing it up to the critical observer.
It might be that those who say God is only found in our imagination have too high an opinion of human creativity. Instead of looking inside our imagination to discover where the idea of God came from, they ought to turn their eyes elsewhere. Psalm 19 says: “The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of His hands.”
Astronauts aside, an objective observer does not have to rocket into outer space to see creation’s mysteries. Many things right under our feet and noses have no explanation other than they were fashioned by an intelligent Someone.
The Bible itself is another way God reveals Himself. He spoke to “holy men” who recorded what He said. This book spans several thousand years of history, was written by 40 or so people, and presents a unified message about God. If these people merely imagined Him, it is odd so diverse a group would agree on even one of His characteristics, let alone all of them.
A third way, not as reliable as the first two, is that God reveals Himself through people. We are made in His image and have some capacity to demonstrate something of His goodness. The downside is that everyone is also prone to disobedience and resisting God. This conflicting capacity to demonstrate evil is not of God or even like Him, but how do we know God is not evil? Nature sometimes seems that way, at least if we look at tornadoes, floods, vicious animals and aggravations like weeds and mosquitoes. Some even think the Bible portrays God as an evil entity, full of wrath and vengeance, who destroys whole families and nations and sends fire from heaven on those who dare to shake their fist in His face.
For the answer, we need to look at the last and most perfect revelation of God: Jesus Christ. The Bible says He “is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of His being . . . .” (Hebrews 1:3)
Jesus Christ is God putting on human flesh, God loving mankind, God willing to share in our humanness and suffer for our sins, dying that we might live forever. We see God’s compassion and power in Jesus. He heals the sick, comforts the hurting, and forgives repentant sinners. Both God’s holy wrath and loving mercy are seen in Jesus who expressed hatred for sin and hypocrisy, yet wept over the unbelief that kept people from recognizing who He was.
My pastor says, “The non-verbal world speaks a language everyone can understand.” Romans 1 puts it like this: “What may be known about God is plain . . . because God has made it plain to them. For since the creation of the world, God’s invisible qualities His eternal power and divine nature have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.”
God is not hiding.
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