A Different God ...

Atheists make a point; if there is a God, why does He let “you” suffer?  And Christians set about the task of apologizing on behalf of Jesus.  Mind you, there is truth in the notion that in order for free will to be free, it must permit the choice of that which is bad for us, it must permit the choice of sin.  And sin brings with it pain and death from cause and effect.  It is also true that in a world that recognizes the existence of God, we must equally recognize the existence of His enemy Satan, who has no compunction over causing pain and death to as many as he can.  Stacking up the impacts of our own bad choices, compounded with others, and increased by the deceiver of souls; quite a bit of damage ensues.  Imagine greed unrestricted for a moment, or lust, or anger.  Were there not some level of restriction held back by the four angels of the four winds we might have completely self-destructed long ago.  So even our continued existence is possible only because our God must interfere within limits or witness His creation commit suicide on mass.

But the nature of the Atheist’s challenge is more personal than why does pain exist at all, it is why does it exist for “you”; for someone who claims belief in Jesus Christ.  The challenge is simply why does God who must at least at some level interfere to preserve you, not do a better job at it?  Why does He not answer the most desperate prayers, or prevent the most heinous tragedies from happening at all?  When asked this, most Christians punt.  The most common refrain is, it is a mystery, that only faith can overcome, and trust that whatever happens is in our best interest permitted by a God who we know loves us with a passion we may never understand.  But that answer still leaves the victim a victim.  Rape victims will still have been raped.  Abuse victims still abused.  The dead still killed by others, or by the cause and effect of their own choices.  Our modern faith seems poised to deal with the aftermath, but seems to have a problem dealing with prevention through consistent direct divine intervention.

Now most Christians have a story or two about some point in their lives where divine intervention was done on their behalf.  God keeps us out of the car accident, or keeps our health going when the normal course of events should have taken us out of planet earth.  So the modern Christian, despite not having a comprehensive answer, has at least a partial one.  Our God has been preserving us.  Without Him, we would have been dead already, or in far worse shape than we find ourselves today.  And some modern Christians hold out hope to be favored by the God of Job; who while He permits calamity to occur, He restores our lives after the damage to a much greater point than before the damage began.  But Job’s first set of children were still dead.  Having a new baby is awesome.  But it does not replace the hole in your heart of losing even one of your children, let alone all of them.

Some modern Christians just write off anything that happens in this world as meaning “less”.  From the point of view of eternity, of life without the pain of sin and the death it brings, nothing that happens in this world can ever deter from the infinite bliss of perfection we will come to live in the hereafter.  This perspective is perhaps the most healthy, as it keeps the eye and the priority on what is really important, and what is not.  It also has the side effect of recognizing we need an end to the sin inside of us, to experience and enjoy what an eternity of perfection has waiting for us in the plain of existence God had in mind originally, and is restoring us to.  But even this perspective is lacking something.  It presumes that God will “do a better job” preserving us, only when conditions are finally favorable.  Why does He not do it today, is another question.  And ultimately it is a question where “we” question just what kind of God He is.  It would appear modern Christianity has lapsed into the service of a different God.  Why, and how, spring to mind.

Matthew records for us, in his gospel intended for a Jewish audience, a picture of what sure looks like a different God than the one we have come to apologize for.  The Jesus Christ who walked the sands of Israel so long ago sure presents as something completely different than the Jesus Christ we struggle to make excuses for today.  And if Jesus has not, or will not, ever change.  Then perhaps it is us who have shifted while the rock remained right where it has been all along.  Take as an example the story of the immediate aftermath of the Sermon on the Mount in chapter eight of Matthews gospel.  What Jesus had done was simply preach a sermon.  There were many truths within it, most centered on Salvation, and how following Jesus, submitting to Him, sees that occur within us.  There were no quid pro quo sections in His sermon.  There were no fantastic promises of wealth offered there, or of control, or of fame.  In fact, the antidote of these things are found buried in His words.  What He values is not based in wealth, but in service, not in control, but in submission, not in fame, but in humility.  His entire value system is upside down from our perspective.  But what was the response to it?

Matthew opens chapter eight in verse 1 saying … “When he was come down from the mountain, great multitudes followed him.”  The people got it.  Rape victims, abuse victims, those victimized by a church whose leadership abused their control, got it.  Salvation was possible through Jesus Christ and honestly that was all that mattered.  They saw a different God than us.  They were certain about a different God than we appear to be.  They began to show it, revealing Him to us, and revealing what we truly believe to ourselves.  Matthew continues in verse 2 saying … “And, behold, there came a leper and worshipped him, saying, Lord, if thou wilt, thou canst make me clean.”  Aids victim, stage four cancer victim, multiple gun shot victim, pick the terminal condition you equate to the most today, and the ancient equivalent was leprosy.  Highly contagious and not well understood, meant complete social ostracization.  No one wanted you around.  You were going to die.  Any remedy had long been forgotten.  You were dirt.  You were less than dirt.

And at least one of them, comes straight up to Jesus after hearing His sermon from afar, and says to Him Lord, “if thou wilt”.  There will be no medication needed, no team of doctors or nurses required.  The man or woman destined to die will come to the Lord of renewal, and state a fact.  This victim knows what Jesus can do.  Jesus need only will it.  No apologies.  No deterrence of faith.  And what happens next separates the God of that man (or woman) from the God of you or I.  Jesus responds in verse 3 saying … “And Jesus put forth his hand, and touched him, saying, I will; be thou clean. And immediately his leprosy was cleansed.”  There was zero delay in His answer.  There was zero equivocation in His answer.  There was zero pre-conditions that had to be met in His answer.  The dead, or destined to be dead, was to be restored in that instant. 

Further, Jesus was not some cold, removed, uncaring person afraid to interact with what you and I are too afraid to love.  Jesus touches Him (or substitute her as many women had leprosy as well).  I imagine Jesus reaching right out to the most infected part of the victim He could easily see, and began the healing right from there.  I imagine seeing not just a cessation of the disease, or stopping its progression, and leaving the scars and missing sections that had already rotted and fallen off.  I imagine Jesus begins re-creating the victim, replacing every missing part with a new one created from the fingertips of the Creator.  I imagine seeing the scars and blemishes fade into the normality of perfection at the time.  Full restoration.  Full recreation.  A point not too subtle for us to see where it comes to our salvation, and the need we have to be re-created from the inside out.

But this must be a different God, than the one modern Christians claim to serve.  There was no delay in what the will of Jesus was.  There was no pondering about it.  It did not take a committee to decide what to do.  It took a man seeing his own need and reaching out to one He knew not only could do it, but would do it.  And Jesus did what Jesus wanted to do for him, and longs to do for each of us.  Jesus then does something that continues to be relevant to us picking up in verse 4 saying … “And Jesus saith unto him, See thou tell no man; but go thy way, shew thyself to the priest, and offer the gift that Moses commanded, for a testimony unto them.”  The way of healing leprosy had been long forgotten by those who ran the church.  They had been given a method of healing it.  But they forgot it, or abandoned it, or perhaps just like modern Christians, began to doubt what their God wanted done in a situation like that.

The leadership of the Jewish faith in the time of Christ served the same God we modern Christians do.  A God whose will is ever in doubt, or cannot be explained.  A God who does not “do” anything, or does not “do” enough.  A different God.  Certainly a different God than Jesus Christ who did not hesitate a single minute healing the man in need right in front of Him.  That God, that Jesus Christ, did not seem to leave us in doubt as to what He will was.  He was asked.  He healed.  End of story.  No doubts.  No difficulty in explanation, but rather extreme clarity.  Jesus does NOT want us to suffer and die.  Jesus came to reverse those conditions within us.  Jesus is NOT only interested in our spiritual condition (though that is the more important one), He is also equally interested in our physical condition.  He restores us, both body and soul.  This is the work Jesus longs to do.  This is that God.  This would by all accounts appear to be someone different than the God we have evolved in our minds is supposed to be Him.  In asking this man to return to the leadership of the church to be a testimony unto them, He is also asking this man to be a testimony unto us.

The rock does not move, only the sands of self do that.  It is not our Jesus who has changed, or wants something different for us than He did for that victim of leprosy.  He wants ALL of His children restored to Him in perfection, not just in mind, or spirituality, but in the bodies He created us to have.  The rock is still there.  It is us who need to return to it.  To conjure a different image of the God we serve, one absent of doubt, and apology.  An image of Jesus as He truly was, not an image of Jesus today masked behind a cloak of invisibility and doubt of intentions.  His intentions have not changed, only our faith in them.  His abilities to restore have not changed, only our perception of our need.  We no longer ask, either with certainty in what He would will, or with faith that an answer will actually be provided.  We ask with doubt, and with coverage in case what we want is rejected with no.  We offer the excuse of “not yet” to our feeble prayers.  But Jesus did not tell the Leper, I will get back to you.  He just healed the victim who needed the healing right in the moment he asked.

If the health of the body of those who are Christians is in disarray today, the responsibility clearly lies on our own doorstep.  The guidance in His word about what is good and what is not for us to eat is clearly outlined.  We know what we need to do from an exercise, sleep, rest and dietary standpoint.  And when disease comes to us in spite of what directions we follow from the word, we have a God whose will it is to heal us immediately, fully, restoratively and on the spot of our question for it.  That is His will.  That is His will for you, for me, and for the entirety of mankind from Adam to us.  Not just for the good people, but for all of them.  Not just for the folks who understand doctrine perfectly, but for those who are mistaken about nearly everything.  The leper did not have doctrinal perfection, he had a singular belief in the “will” of Jesus Christ.  That is the will of that Jesus Christ who scripture bares witness to.  Who is the Jesus Christ you serve?  Is it the same guy? 

Do you serve that God, or have the shifting sands of your perceptions invented a new version of Jesus Christ, a much lesser version, a version we feel the need to apologize for when the tough questions are posed, because the physical proof seems lacking all the time.  Have we, like our Pharisee forefathers, found a different God; or are we ready to serve the Jesus Christ who even today stands right in front of us as He ever was, His will clear to restore what is broken within us, both body and soul.  Are we ready to ask Him now, seeing our need, and “knowing” His will?  Are we prepared for the yes, we have so long believed was only rarely granted, but now will be our regularity?  I am tired of the different God, I have constructed in my mind, I would rather return to the Rock who has not moved, and the certainty in what He wills.  Is anyone else ready as well?

 

Restoration from Dependence ...

So often, we come to believe that the success of spreading the gospel depends upon us.  We come to believe “we” have a work to complete before the Lord can return to our world.  “We” may be privileged (or burdened depending on your point of view) to be the last generation, “responsible” for getting it done.  The problem of course in all of this thinking, is that “we” have historically proven that “we” cannot be depended upon to get anything right, let alone done, much less perfectly.  If the return of our Lord, and the success of Christianity depends upon “us” to get it right and get it done … the promise of the Lord to return will forever be delayed.  Instead, when God makes a promise, He does the work and takes the action needed to see that it gets done, and is fulfilled.  He never intended to leverage our strengths, but rather to use us in spite of our lack of ability to accomplish His will; allow His strength to flow through us (not to originate there). 

When the Messiah first came to this world, it was not because Mary had spent a lifetime preparing to be a virgin mother.  No one taught her what that was going to mean, how could they?  It had never happened before.  Imagine how hard it would have been to have maintained chastity only to be found with child.  Who would believe it?  Not even Joseph, who loved her and arguably was an upright man, until the Angel came to him to explain it was true.  What was impossible for mankind, what had never been done in the history of the world, was in fact done through the power of God.  “Mary” did not accomplish this miraculous feat.  She was but a willing participant in channeling the power of our God.  Our God did not “need’ Mary specifically, instead He chose to honor her with participation in the great mission of redemption.  He did not look for her to first accomplish some set of tests, and great actions of heroes worthy of Greek poems to be selected for her role.  Instead He looked for humility, kindness, meekness, and a willingness to be a part of His divine will and mission for our redemption.  What no one else on planet earth may ever believe of her story, she would know to be true.  No prep, just a full dependence on God that He meant what He said, and would do what He promised.

Now, so many years later, we would do well to study the example of Christ.  If we too are to be willing participants in the mission of God for the redemption of the world, the “how” Christ did what He did, should be equally as important to us, as the “what” He did.  If like Mary, it is not going to rely upon “our” strength to accomplish His will, or even “our” preparation to begin His work; we should look to Christ to uncover “how” He found a way to participate in the divine mission of His Father while in human form.  Peter spends a great deal of time recounting this to John Mark in the writing of the first gospel to mankind.  He begins in chapter one, in verse 35 recalling … “And in the morning, rising up a great while before day, he went out, and departed into a solitary place, and there prayed.”

Jesus had just spent the evening, following the close of the Sabbath healing everyone in Capernaum of every disease they had.  He had cast out demons, while restraining them from further identifying Him as the Son of the Most High.  All in all, the power of God the Father reflected perfectly through His Son for the benefit of mankind had to be very tiring.  The emotional drain on humanity to have been so intimate with so many in desperate need - had to be rough.  Imagine yourself, entering the hospital room of your own 3 or 4 children all stricken with terminal diseases, and you now performing a supernatural healing on each of them.  Imagine the sadness of encountering them in this condition at all.  Then imagine the relief as they are now healed.  Then imagine the need each of them would have to hug you, hold you, and thank you for what you have done.  To each of your children, this is a life changing event.  They loved you before, and now love you even more.  Each will really want to express that love to you – individually, not as a group.  A healing is not a “corporate” event, it is a personal one.  It is not a “casual” event to be taken off the terminal disease list.  It is a life extending, life altering one, that has no other human equal.

While God may be omnipresent, and have the divine strength to handle multiple people expressing individual gratitude love and intimacy all at once, Christ was still bound in human flesh, and human form, subject to the same emotional limits as are we.  Being touched with our infirmities was more than just “seeing” how hard sin is on us, it is about seeing the “limits” our humanity can take.  So how does the surely exhausted Savior respond to these emotionally fulfilling yet draining events?  He rises up very  early before the day begins, and seeks the solitude of a deserted location in order to pray.  You would think His body must have ached for sleep.  It did.  You would think He might be hungry as He is not heading out to a Denny’s or an IHOP to have breakfast, read the paper, and do a little praying.  No, He is not looking to find a nice picnic spot and enjoy some left over fish and pita bread.  He is looking for a place where He can be alone from humanity and have His full attention directed on praying to know “what is the will of His Father” next.  In so doing, hunger abates, exhaustion disappears, and He emerges from this experience renewed at full strength – for it is not His human form that originates this strength within Him, it is allowing the strength of His Father to cover all those human needs.

Peter, and the other disciples, rise much later.  And realizing that a disciple really only has one key “job” in the title of being a disciple – that is to “follow” your leader – they come to the horrifying discovery that they have “lost” sight of their leader (again).  He recounts in verse 36 … “And Simon and they that were with him followed after him. [verse 37] And when they had found him, they said unto him, All men seek for thee.”  You can bet, Peter was likely frustrated that he and the others had to “find” Jesus in the first place.  The popularity of their master was at an all-time high since the night before.  By extension, the popularity of the disciples would be at an all-time high as well.  However, the value of the disciple was only as good as his proximity to his Leader (it still is).  If Peter could not introduce men to his Lord, his value as a disciple was not so great and would diminish quickly (it still does).  So when Jesus disappears to renew His own strength in seeking the will of His Father, Peter cannot equate.  In any case, finding Jesus, he can remind Him that there are many men waiting to see Him and hear from Him.

Mark continues to chronicle the story in verse 38 … “And he said unto them, Let us go into the next towns, that I may preach there also: for therefore came I forth. [verse 39] And he preached in their synagogues throughout all Galilee, and cast out devils.”  It is important to note, Christ did NOT set the agenda of what to do next, UNTIL He had prayed to His Father God to find out what it was.  The mission was set by God the Father, not the human will of Jesus Christ.  The strength to do this mission was provided through communion with God the Father, not based on the human strength of Jesus Christ.  Jesus does not tease Peter for being a disciple who lost his Lord (nor does He tease us).  Jesus also does not respond to any frustration in the voice of Peter, or address Peter’s potentially very selfish motives in trying to gain honor by being closest to Christ in proximity.  Instead, He ignores what might be the weakness of men, and stays focused on the will of His Father.  Christ does not demand the perfection of Peter before they move on to do the will of God, only Peter’s willingness to keep moving.

It will be the process of being with Christ that will one day bring perfection of character to Peter (as it is with us).  That process is nowhere near completion at this point, but it has begun.  Peter is NOT perfect, he does NOT have perfect doctrines or scriptural understanding – yet Christ is willing to continue to use him and be with him as they both set out to accomplish the will of His Father.  Jesus is more interested in Peter’s ability to love, than in his wisdom.  The mistakes Peter is sure to make do nothing to discourage Jesus from staying with Peter.  No, instead Jesus realizes that Peter will never slow down making mistakes unless he can witness firsthand what the will of God the Father is for mankind (and it still works this way for us).  Jesus is not depending on Peter to get the work done, He is honoring Peter with participation in the work Jesus performs Himself.  Jesus continues to preach, teach, and heal, even casting out demons.

Mark continues in verse 40 saying … “And there came a leper to him, beseeching him, and kneeling down to him, and saying unto him, If thou wilt, thou canst make me clean.”  Again, the social norms are to be upset.  Leprosy is fatal in this time, and easily contagious.  It is a living death sentence and those afflicted have time to endure the pain of rotting flesh, and isolation from everyone they knew or loved.  These souls are as “diseased” as you can get, and ostracized by those who are supposed to love them, for the fear of becoming like them.  How like us.  We look at those in the world, bound by sins that do not tempt our hearts, and our first response is to cast them out of our fellowship and condemn them for the sin ridden diseases they are enslaved to.  Instead of loving them back to redemption, we isolate them from our presence for “fear” of becoming like them.  But this is NOT the response Christ has.

Peter recalls to John Mark in verse 41 writing … “And Jesus, moved with compassion, put forth his hand, and touched him, and saith unto him, I will; be thou clean. [verse 42] And as soon as he had spoken, immediately the leprosy departed from him, and he was cleansed.”  First things first, the man standing or kneeling before him is STILL sick.  He is NOT clean yet.  He is ridden with filth and rotting flesh, completely unworthy of standing in the presence of the most pure Son of God.  Christ looks at this rotting living corpse and does NOT move away, or move to isolate him, or get him away from his disciples.  Instead Jesus Christ is “moved with compassion”.  When our Lord looks upon us in our enslavement to the sins we have chosen to embrace, He is again “moved with compassion”.  That compassion is the reason for the gospel.  He is not here to condemn us, judge us, and righteously execute us for the sins we are plainly guilty of committing.  He is here to restore us unto Himself.  He immediately puts forth His hand and touches Him.  Immediate physical contact to a contagiously diseased man; a gesture of love no one will understand.  It is as if Christ is looking to get sick, but that is not how He sees it.

Instead Jesus does for the leper what He also does for us in our sins; instead of leaving us there in them, He removes them from our lives.  He heals this man.  Compassion, and a gesture of love and affirmation and intimacy are not enough, He follows through with a complete healing – of both the leper and of us.  Compassion drives Christ to change the life of the leper through healing.  It is no less so with our lives bound in the terminal disease of sin.  Compassion does not cause Christ to have a momentary event of pity for the leper and then simply move on, as nothing can be done for a person bound to a terminal incurable disease (much like sin).  Instead compassion motivates Christ to take an immediate and life altering interest in the leper to remove from him what was making him sick.  So it is with us.  The terminal disease of our sin is not something we can heal ourselves from.  We have chosen it, embraced it, and it is consuming us.  But our savior is moved with compassion to heal us, not leave us to rot in our sins.  He is the one who removes them from us, as we, like the leper allow Him to do so. 

Notice too, the effects of what Christ did are immediate and fully restorative.  Whatever fingers or toes, or facial features that have long since rotted away and fallen off of this poor man, are immediately re-created and restored to him.  He is not merely free of further disintegration; he is restored to his former natural state.  His nose and ears, and extremities work again.  His flesh is made clean by the power of Christ.  When our sin is removed from our lives, it does not just leave an empty hole in its place.  We too are restored, brought into alignment with the law of God, in harmony with it.  We begin to think differently, to love differently, and see scriptures more deeply through the lens of Jesus Christ.  And we discover the beauty of loving others, instead of loving only self.  Our restoration is also full, and in the process of time, we experience it deeper every day.

Mark continues the story in verse 43 … “And he straitly charged him, and forthwith sent him away; [verse 44] And saith unto him, See thou say nothing to any man: but go thy way, shew thyself to the priest, and offer for thy cleansing those things which Moses commanded, for a testimony unto them.”  The secrecy the man is charged with has a primary purpose, to see the religious leadership come to redemption as well.  Christ hopes that in reminding the leadership of the church of His day, that restoration even from the most deadly disease was always possible when in harmony with the will and love of God the Father; that perhaps He can reach the hearts of the Pharisees and Sadducees. Crowd control, was only a secondary concern.  Redemption was always the primary.  Christ had and has no less interest in reaching the leaders of His church, as He does in the members of it.  But alas, men do, what men wish to do, even when directed by God to do something different.

Mark writes in verse 45 … “But he went out, and began to publish it much, and to blaze abroad the matter, insomuch that Jesus could no more openly enter into the city, but was without in desert places: and they came to him from every quarter.”  If the man had followed the direction of Christ, perhaps the religious leaders might have joined in following Jesus.  But the healed leper did not follow instructions, and as a result the leaders only hardened their positions against this upstart, who seems to deny the counsel of Moses.  The exuberance of the former leper, and the marked physical differences in his appearance, were a testimony to the entire nation about what kind of restoration the Messiah had brought into their midst.  But like us, they did not see the parallels in the removal of sins, which is more important, they thought only of the physical difference an encounter with Christ could make.  Instead of seeing the deeper picture of restoration a dependence on Christ could make in their souls, freeing them from sins they had been bound to their entire lives, they saw only restored noses, ears, and eyes. 

The reward of our gospel, is not found in the prolonging of life in this world, it is found the alteration of how we live each day.  The gospel of dependence and restoration through Jesus Christ, may have the side benefit of making us see clearer, hear better, and smell more than we ever have before.  But the primary benefit is that it can enable us to love deeper than we ever have before.  The “success” of this gospel message does NOT rely on us.  It relies on the strength of Jesus Christ and His Father God.  We are merely honored to participate in a work He is already doing.  We like Peter and the others, have so often lost sight of our Lord, have to search to find Him again from our own choices to look away and trust to self.  But like the disciples of old, our value is defined in our proximity to Jesus, in our ability to introduce others to Him.  It is our dependence that will see us freed, restored, and reconciled to the side of Jesus Christ as He returns to take us home.