You know when people get together and talk about God, we often ...usually give our opinions on somethings we know about God. Whether we picked them up in our travels, inner circles, or maybe some good ol' fashioned pulpit churching. Some even already know that the conversation is going to either be that of debate (most of the time it is) or people accept it with gladness but still have questions (many of which will be answered as they walk longer with the Lord).
And, whether it's in a group or conversation with others...or posting something on the web for others to read; people already have you sized up- and at best are hoping you're going to show a foundation for what you believe. I hope I believe I can do that here.
But other than what we believe we know about God; do we really know Him? Out of all the religions in the world all have a perceived idea of who God is, and what He expects from us. But have we thought about what He has given to us?
Yes, I know...you've heard it before. Jesus came and died for our sins. YES! That's true! Amen? There is much more that people want to know; and rightly so- There is so much more to know...but, if that's all you knew and believed in Jesus that He took your place and died for you to remove your sins from you, then you're doing better than some. Some people sadly, believing they know all that they need to know; they walk on; making light of it- not really seriously taking to heart their walk with God.
But that's where it's all at- Our hearts.
If people knew how good God was.... is, they would love Him and live for Him; encouraging others to do also. And that in turn would probably solve all the problems of the world eh? But in the words of an former uncompromising pastor, there are "those people" out there who, with their own take on things; slander God and do their best to keep others from knowing what a good God He really is.
But why?
One of the biggest problems is religion’s misuse of the Law. Trying to identify God through ONLY the Old Testament, the Old Covenant. This has done tremendous damage to God’s image. The Law came by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ (John 1:17). The Law wasn’t inaccurate.... but incomplete. And if it is not properly applied, it gives a wrong representation of who God is.
Jesus was....is the perfect representation of God (Heb. 1:3). He said if we have seen Him, then we have seen the Father (John 14:9). He did exactly what He saw His Father do (John 5:19). Jesus showed us that God is love (1 John 4:8). Yet the Jews constantly accused Him of breaking the Law of God.
Of course, Jesus didn’t break His Father's Law. He’s the only One who ever truly kept the entire Law. But the mercy and grace Jesus extended toward people was a lot different from the “eye for eye” and “tooth for tooth” of the Old Testament Law (Ex. 21:23-25).
Jesus forgave a woman whom the Law condemned to death (John 8:1-11). Jesus ate and fellowshipped with publicans and sinners, which the legalistic Jews of the day wouldn’t do- (Matt. 9:11). Jesus touched the untouchable (Matt. 8:3) and loved the unlovable (Luke 8:2). Jesus set a standard that even today, people find it hard to walk in. He showed the world grace and mercy, which the Old Testament Law didn’t do. Instead of punishment, God extended grace!
A wrong understanding of the purpose of the Old Testament Law leads to a misunderstanding of Who God is. Most people believe God gave the Law to show us what we needed to do to obtain a relationship with Him. But the Law was never intended to bring us into relationship with our Heavenly Father. It was intended to show us our sin and our need for God-our own inability to attain perfection was lost; we need a Savior!
So many religions out in the world today put everything on our shoulders. Even good philosophies keep our focus on ourselves. We have limitations in case some didn't know that. We could never pick our own selves up by our own bootstraps. It takes something bigger than us to make it to the good side of the final, or rather beginning of our destination.
But getting back to the Law of God; if we look into books like Exodus and Leviticus we can see it was much more than just 10 Commandments. There were literally hundreds of laws and tenants (do's and Don't's); procedures that had to be obeyed properly by God's guidelines. The 10 Commandments were a basic foundation of the Law. The Law was God's idea of perfection.
The Law was established to show us how unholy we were so we would despair of trying to earn salvation and just receive it as a gift by faith. It was to turn us from self-righteousness to a faith-righteousness that could only come through a Savior (Rom. 10:3-4). You see, out of all the religions in the world, man places his/her faith in themselves, believing more of what they can do instead of what has been done for them by a true and living God.
In Christianity, we are placing our total faith in Someone bigger than us. In most other religions, it's mankind attempting to reach God, nirvana, etc...but with Christianity, it's God/Jesus reaching out to us!
Consider some of the things the Scripture says about the Law:
• The Law strengthened sin (1 Cor. 15:56).
• The Law was a ministry of death and condemnation (2 Cor. 3:7 and 9).
• The Law gave guilt and knowledge of sin, not salvation (Rom. 3:19-20).
• The Law made sin come alive, and killed us (Rom. 7:9).
• The Law magnified sin and produced hopelessness (Rom. 7:13-25).
Why would God give us something with all these negative effects? Because we were already beaten by sin and just didn’t know it. Before we could be motivated to receive God’s gift of salvation by grace through faith in a Savior-Jesus, we needed to be convinced that we couldn’t save ourselves. That has not changed; we still cannot, regardless of how good "we think" we are, or can operate in this world or society- we can never reach the top, or be our own savior.
The Lord revealed His standard of holiness (the Law), which was infinitely higher than any of us could ever attain. We had to come to the end of ourselves as sometimes we do; and doing so before we could begin to find God. The Law was perfectly suited to do just that. It shut us up to faith so the only way we could look.....was up (Gal. 3:23).
When the Law is used for that purpose, then it is good (1 Tim. 1:8). But when people are taught that God’s blessings are dependent upon our performance, that kills faith in what Jesus did for us. Old Tyme Religion has taught that we have to fulfill the demands of the Law in order for God to love us or use us. That’s totally wrong!
For 2,000 years, after Adam and Eve blew it in the Garden, God dealt with mankind through mercy and grace, which wasn’t evident when the Law came.
Really? Yes, and to show that we read that God protected the first murderer (Gen. 4:15) instead of killing him as the Law later prescribed (Lev. 24:17). Abraham married his half-sister, which the Law said was punishable by death (Lev. 18:9). Jacob married two women who were sisters, which the Law condemned to death (Lev. 18:18). Yet Abraham and Jacob became two great patriarchs of the Old Testament because God wasn’t imputing man’s sins unto him at that time (Rom. 5:13). But when the Law came, God’s wrath was released against sin (Rom. 4:15), and we got caught in the middle. God smote people with leprosy (Num. 12:10 and 2 Chr. 26:19 20) and all manner of plagues (Deut. 28:15-68) because of sin.
Yet this wasn’t God’s original displayed reaction to man's sin, as can be seen by the fact that it was 2,000 years after Adam and Eve's sinning when He gave the Law and released His wrath. He wasn’t imputing man’s sin unto him until the Law was given. Pretty simple!
The Law made sin come alive, and it killed us (Rom. 7:9). The Law released God’s wrath (Rom. 4:15). This served two main purposes. First, God’s display of His wrath against sin forever changed the way man thought of sin. Now he had graphic evidence of how much God hated sin, so this served as a deterrent to sin in the early history of earth.
Second, and more importantly, the Law gave such a perfect standard of performance that those who understood it clearly saw that they could NEVER be good enough to receive anything from God. It took away any deception that God owed us anything, and it made us throw ourselves on God for mercy. That’s BIG, and that’s what the Law was intended to do.
A proper use of the Law drives us to God for mercy and not away from God in guilt and condemnation. Once we come to Jesus and receive salvation as a gift (Rom. 6:23), we are no longer under the Law but under grace (Rom. 6:14).
God always wanted to relate to us by grace, but He couldn’t just look the other way and ignore sin. The sin debt had to be paid. That’s why Jesus came. He suffered all of God’s wrath against all the sin of all of mankind (John 12:32). Those who receive God’s grace by accepting salvation as a gift by faith in Jesus don’t have anymore wrath against them. The Lord will never be angry with us or rebuke us (Is. 54:9). Hallelujah!
Our sin debt has been paid and believing that Jesus paid it and asking God to save us to come into our lives and be God over us...we are born again by His Spirit and have become the righteousness of God in Christ (2 Cor. 5:21). This is the great exchange. He not only took away our sin but gave us His righteousness and we didn't have to measure up to any standard to get it! That's a lot better than what other religions only say they can have; but never really showing the reality or result of such.
In Christianity, we have a relationship, not a religion. It's one thing to know that God loves us, but it's really radical to think that not only does He love us, but God actually likes us! It's sad to think that so many people on the earth give that up for some other "way" or that they don't think that they are good enough to come before a holy God- well, God wants us to come to Him...always.
I know there are a lot of Christians that make mistakes all the time (I'm one of them); but my mistake will not be mentioned in the annuls of the future. Not because I have attained, but because I placed my faith in Someone bigger than me. So am I preaching here....? Maybe. But I wanted to share this little bit (I've only scraped the surface in this particular topic) with you in hopes of encouraging you to look for more out of life; to truly find out what's missing in your life...in your heart- That, there is a God, and we need to know Him. Our future, even on this plane depends on Who you know, not always what we know (mind knowledge).
We can have cleanness and holiness in our spirits as Jesus is (1 John 4:17). And that’s powerful. If we all could understand just this little bit that I've shared in this post, it would change everything in your life and maybe the lives of others you come into contact with.
So many of us at one time or another have thought that we knew God or that we know some things about God (and we thought that was enough)- and that's fine and well. We just need to make sure that we don't just know about God, but that we really know Him, in our hearts. But did you know....you can’t have a good relationship with someone you don’t really know.
If we have goals of changing the world, forget it...let's rather work on getting out hearts changed and helping others get the same. But before we can do that, we need to "know" the Changer of hearts personally...without religious tenants, but understanding God with our hearts- you know....the place He wants to dwell. Let Him today!