The True Nature Of
God
God
is a good God! He isn't mad at us. He not
only loves us, He likes us! He will never
leave us nor forsake us, no matter how badly
we miss it. His mercies are new every morning!
Our sin does not affect His opinion of us
nor cause Him to withhold His blessing!
Great is His faithfulness!
Those
are radical statements! Just think about
the typical Christian teaching concerning
God today. Usually, God is represented as
stern, angry, and ready to get us for the
slightest misstep. Or at least He certainly
won't answer our prayers if we sin. That's
wrong, and it leads to wrong conclusions
and attitudes toward God that hinder an
intimate relationship with Him.
So
why is the Lord represented so harshly?
The answer can be found in the lack of understanding
of the harmony between the Old and New Testament.
In the Old Testament, the Lord vented His
anger and judgment often, and in devastating
ways.
There
was Noah s flood; the destruction of Sodom
and Gomorrah; a death angel killed all the
firstborn of Egypt in one night; another
angel killed 185,000 Assyrian soldiers in
one night; and on and on the list goes.
There is no doubt our God is a holy God
who hates sin and demands justice.
However,
there is also the portrait of God that Jesus
painted through His teachings and actions.
He showed mercy to the worst of sinners,
associated with publicans and harlots, loved
the unlovely, and His ultimate action of
dying for our sins proved beyond any doubt
that He came to save the world, not condemn
it.
How
does this fit with the Old Testament view
of the harshness and severity of God? Is
God schizophrenic? Does He sometimes love
us and other times hate us? How can
we have a healthy relationship with someone
who changes His moods frequently?
These
questions present a dilemma that has kept
many people at arm s length from the Lord.
The vast majority of people KNOW there
is a God; they just don't know how to relate
to Him. They are confused because mixed
signals have been sent to them, often by
the church.
A
minister will say that it was the Lord,
in His sovereignty, who killed a baby; and
in the next breath, the minister will ask
if anyone wants to serve this GOOD GOD.
We are told that God won t answer the prayer
of anyone in sin, and yet we are told that
we all sin. Where does that leave us? Without
a prayer!
There
is a simple answer to these questions, and
a harmony between the wrath and mercy of
God. God is not schizophrenic. There
is one, true nature of God clearly represented
in the Word, and that is LOVE!
First
John 4:8 says,
"God is love."
He
doesn't just love at times. Love is
the nature of God! Jesus gave us the greatest
representation of the true nature of God
ever presented.
God
placed our sins on Jesus and punished Him
in our place. God satisfied His own demands
for justice, not by punishing us, but by
punishing His Son in our place. This wasn't
a partial payment which required adding
our holiness; it was a total payment that
leaves us with nothing to do except believe
and receive, or doubt and do without.
Jesus'
payment for our sins forever changed our
relationship with the Father. If Jesus had
made His sacrifice for sins in the Old Testament,
then we wouldn't have seen the wrath of
God vented as recorded in the Old Testament
scriptures.
Here's
an example. In 2 Kings 1, Elijah called
fire down from heaven and killed 102 soldiers
who had come to arrest him. Jesus' disciples
asked to do the same thing and cited Elijah
as their example. Jesus rebuked them for
even thinking about such an act and said,
"Ye
know not what manner of spirit ye are of.
For the Son of man is not come to destroy
men's lives, but to save them " (Luke
9:55-56).
Jesus
rebuked His disciples for trying to follow
Elijah's example. This shows that if Jesus
had been present on the earth in His role
as Messiah, this act of judgment wouldn't
have happened. There is a difference between
the way God dealt with mankind under the
Old Covenant and the way He deals with mankind
under the New Covenant.
Before
the sacrifice of Jesus, there was judgment.
But it wasn't because the Lord desired to
punish us. His nature has always been love.
However, a price had to be paid for sin,
and until that sacrifice was made, there
had to be consequences.
It's
similar to training children. If you wait
to begin disciplining your children until
they are old enough to fully comprehend
exactly what you say, you and the child
will be in big trouble. A child has to be
restrained from doing wrong from a very
young age.
At
one or two years old, they may not understand
that it's the devil tempting them to take
their sibling's toys. However, they can
understand, "If you do that again,
you are going to get a spanking." They
may not comprehend heaven and hell issues,
but when the devil tempts them with covetousness,
they will say NO, because they fear a spanking.
Likewise,
before the new birth, people were sinning
and that sin was destroying their lives.
God didn't want to punish them. He was willing
to show them mercy on credit, in a sense,
looking forward to the sacrifice of His
own Son for their sins. People began to
take the lack of God's judgment as approval.
This
can be clearly seen with Cain and his descendants.
Cain killed his brother Abel because of
jealousy (Gen. 4). Instead of punishment,
God extended mercy toward Cain, even putting
a mark on his forehead to warn others that
God was protecting him.
Cain's
great-great-great-grandson, Lamech, interpreted
this as approval of murder. He killed a
man in self-defense and, therefore, felt
more justified in his killing than Cain.
He said that if God would avenge Cain sevenfold,
then He would avenge Lamech seventy and
sevenfold.
God
didn't say that, Lamech did. Lamech was
presuming on God because of His grace toward
Cain. Therefore, mankind began to move so
far away from a proper standard of holiness
that if God hadn't intervened, there wouldn't
have been a virgin left to give birth to
Jesus.
Paul
wrote in 2 Corinthians 10:12,
"But they measuring themselves by themselves,
and comparing themselves among themselves,
are not wise."
This
has always been the case. If one person
gets by with sin, others will take that
as an approval of sin. So before the Lord
could produce the new birth, where He lives
within us and guides us through the indwelling
of His Holy Spirit, He placed external restraints
on sin that even lost people could understand.
"You sin and you die." That's
the way it was.
That
wasn't the way God really wanted it to
be, but sin had to be restrained until Jesus'
atoning sacrifice was made. God's withholding
of punishment for sin had led to a total
loss of a true standard of right and wrong.
Mankind had compared themselves with others
so often and for so long that no one knew
what God originally intended. Something
had to be done.
Sin
was destroying the human race and needed
to be restrained. Therefore, God gave the
Law. But why didn't He give the Law to
Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden 2,000
years earlier and prevent these problems?
Because of love. The Law had serious side
effects of condemnation and guilt. God didn't
want us running from Him out of fear but
to Him because of love and grace.
The
Law was never God's plan for salvation.
It was God showing us that we could never
measure up to His holy standard. It was
given to drive us from self-righteousness
and toward receiving the sacrifice of Jesus
by faith.
Amazingly,
the church has interpreted it in the opposite
way. Most Christians think the Law is wonderful,
that God expects us to keep it, and that
His response to us is based on our compliance.
That's just not true!
The
Law was given for two main purposes. First,
the fear of God's punishment constrained
sin in people's lives, thereby diminishing
Satan's inroads. Second, it totally took
away all hope of being saved by any virtue
of themselves. The Law made everyone guilty
before God with no hope of justice. We needed
mercy.
Those
were the main purposes of the Law. It was
not God s list of steps one through ten
thousand of what you must do to be right
with Him. It was God's list of all you have
done wrong, proving that you can never be
right with God unless He provides another
form of payment. It was not to set you free.
The Law was to bind and destroy you. It
was a severe spanking for the whole human
race to turn us from sin and self-salvation.
This
is one of the most radical teachings I've
ever done with an abundance of Scripture
references for every point. I 've not included
all the references in this teaching, because
they are too numerous and need some explanation.
But it's imperative that you understand
these truths.
I
have made this teaching, The True Nature
of God, available in book form or a
three-part tape or CD album. In it I harmonize
the judgment of the Old Testament with the
grace and mercy of the New Testament to
reveal one, true nature of God. This is
a life-changing teaching.
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