Never lose sight of who God is…

If I’m learning anything in this late-life effort to finish a master’s degree, it is that a person’s view of God affects all that we think or do. That is, if my foundation and end goals are anything other than God, then I have made another god, for He alone is the first and the last. There is no one or nothing that can be what He is or do what He can do — unless I tell myself lies and refuse to worship Him.

Thus says the Lord, the King of Israel and his Redeemer, the Lord of hosts: “I am the first and I am the last; besides me there is no god. Who is like me? Let him proclaim it. Let him declare and set it before me, since I appointed an ancient people. Let them declare what is to come, and what will happen. Fear not, nor be afraid; have I not told you from of old and declared it? And you are my witnesses! Is there a God besides me? There is no Rock; I know not any.” (Isaiah 44:6–8)

Today’s devotional says that to deny the transcendence of Almighty God puts my moral life in danger for when God is not God (in my estimation only, for what I think does not change who He is), then good ceases to be beautiful and sin ceases to be ugly. Whenever my idea of good and my evaluation of evil begin to blur and I treat neither as important, then I have lost the wonder of God, His holiness and surpassing excellence.

Writers are told to be careful with protagonists and villains for there is good and evil in all. That is, show the quirks in your hero and the soft side of your antagonist. Make them real, not flat, uninteresting and unbelievable. While I agree with that advice, we are also told that the human race really has no authority to say what is right and what is wrong. For many the divine Word, “Thou shalt not” is passé, and there is no atonement for guilt, even no guilt because there is no Spirit of a holy God to convince of sin. If God is acknowledged, He is kindly — like a grandfather, or absent like many contemporary fathers. Such thinking confuses good with evil and messes with my conscience.

I’m a closet fiction writer with a strong imagination for plot, yet I also realize that logical outcomes do not work either. The world wants ‘out of the box’ thinking but it must fit their worldview. That is, my hero can be good or bad, but never weak. In story life, the weak do not win, nor do those who worship God. Both are seen as powerless because the idea is that God is weak, powerless, even absent, and certainly not holy or excellent.

In this week’s lectures, one of my professors says that God seems bent on carrying out His work on earth with one arm tied behind His back. That is, the church and individual Christians are weak and unable. We seem like the ‘heroes’ in a bad book of fiction, or worse, the villains. However, the Bible says God uses those who are weak to demonstrate His great power. Paul expressed it concerning his own status. As the “hero” of the faith, he was not perfect or strong, but weak.

So to keep me from becoming conceited because of the surpassing greatness of the revelations, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to harass me, to keep me from becoming conceited. Three times I pleaded with the Lord about this, that it should leave me. But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong. (2 Corinthians 12:7–10)

Again, this goes back to my ideas about a transcendent God. If God is God, then I am nothing and must be okay with that. Weakness makes me rely on Him, but so does having a strong concept of who He is, of His transcendence. If I decide He is anything less (even though He cannot be anything less), then I will rely on myself and my own ideas, and thus write a confusing and foolish plot for my own life.

I need the wrath of God

Several people that I know promote peace, which is good, but theirs is a form of peace that will compromise what the Bible says in the name of unity, rather than stand firm on God’s Word and offend someone. This position distorts what Scripture says about God, even to putting an odd spin on the parts that do not agree with their concept of Him.

For instance, they have decided that wrath does not belong to God, that this a purely human and sinful trait. For them, God is never angry, nor should we be angry. Instead, He is meek, mild and passive, and we need to be like that too.

There is some truth in that. Our anger often has selfish and sinful motivations. We could do with a lot more meekness at times. However, some things should raise our hackles, and it is possible to be angry without sinning.

Be angry and do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger, and give no opportunity to the devil. (Ephesians 4:26–27)

As I understand Scripture, the wrath of God is without sin. He is holy, pure, and so far above us in character and nature that we cannot imagine or understand His purity. At the same time, He hates sin. What kind of a god would He be if He didn’t?

Your throne, O God, is forever and ever. The scepter of your kingdom is a scepter of uprightness; you have loved righteousness and hated wickedness. (Psalm 45:6)

How could there be goodness in God if He was not angry at sin? Spurgeon even asks how could there be goodness in a person who was never angry at sin, who didn’t love truth and hate every false way? We are not to express this passion in sinful ways. Nevertheless, holy people should hate sin.

Those who think God is without wrath point to Jesus Christ as their image of God (which He is) but forget how Jesus hated sin when He was tempted. He hated it in others even though He showed this anger more often in tears of pity and sorrow than in words of rebuke.

However, consider the emotions behind these words: “Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees . . . ” which were repeated several times before a long list of condemnations that included, “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs, which outwardly appear beautiful, but within are full of dead people’s bones and all uncleanness” (Matthew 23:27).

Jesus hated wickedness so much that He bled to wound it to the core. He died that it might die, was buried that He might bury it and rose again that He might forever trample it beneath his feet.

The Gospel of Jesus Christ is opposed to wickedness in every shape and form. When Jesus found it in the temple, He made a scourge of small cords and overturned it out of the temple. This was not the action of a pacifist.

He will not tolerate wickedness in my heart either. I have known His sorrow over sin, even His anger. I understand His abhorrence and wrath. As much as He loves me, so much also is His hatred of sin and His anger against all forms of wickedness.

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Lord, You are angry with the evil that tries to control and destroy Your people. It gave You such grief and emotion that You came to earth and laid down You life to conquer it. May those who try to write that out of Your character realize that by doing that and trying to imitate that, they are leaving themselves without the emotion needed to work with You in our battle against sin. Help me hate sin in myself as much as You hate it. May that anger against sin produce in me a passion that is willing to do whatever it takes to banish all sin from my heart.