Spirituality Column #363
October 29, 2013
Current in Carmel-Westfield-Noblesville-Fishers-Zionsville

By Bob Walters

Let’s consider the confusing, co-existent Christian truths that while God never changes, the Bible’s Old and New Testaments make God seem very “changed” indeed.

The Old Testament tracks God as He creates the world, sets the heavens in motion, creates the firmament, fish, flora, fauna and mankind, declares His own glory, goodness and righteousness, instructs His nation Israel, demands obedience and worship, fearsomely inspires the prophets, and all along has a ring-side seat for a world of sin, calamity and chaos over which He reigns with wrath, judgment and retribution.

Who wants that God?

The New Testament gives us the suffering servant Jesus Christ.  He was God born fully-man into poverty and questionable family circumstances who toiled most of His earthly life in the remote obscurity of an un-respected village.  In His late 20s He began preaching a message of divine love and salvation few could fathom, drafted a ministry team of misfits few could understand, performed miracles few could ignore and professed truths few could grasp.  He drove out demons who knew who He was and befuddled religious leaders who didn’t.  Jesus was betrayed, arrested, abandoned, beaten, convicted, humiliated, tortured and crucified; dying gruesomely, miserably, alone on a cross.

Who wants to follow or obey or share the misery of that God?

We are to believe Jesus is the same strong God of the Old Testament, where 33 times we are told God is everlasting and unchanging.  How does the same eternal God of wrath, judgment, and retribution become a temporal man who suffers the wrath, judgment and retribution of mankind?

We need only to understand that it is not God who is different; it’s the end of the story that is different.  And Jesus Christ is the end of the story.

Notice that the New Testament actually has a conclusion – the Resurrection, Ascension, Reign, and Victory of Jesus Christ over death, sin and Satan, while the Old Testament – enormously and tellingly – sets up a narrative without an ending.

God’s Old Testament covenant of laws teaches us important truths about both God and humans alike.  Truths such as, God is good, creative, righteous, and demands glory.  And truths like, man generally does a miserable job of following God’s rules.

What’s changed in the New Testament isn’t God; it is God’s New Covenant of faith in Jesus Christ providing loving, flowing grace in the face of man’s many failures.

Mankind is still befallen by sin, calamity and chaos, so our merciful opportunity in Christ – for joy in this life and eternal life glorying God – is a real switcheroo.

Walters (rlwcom@aol.com) notes that while learning grace is the first lesson of Christ, forgetting grace is the first mistake of many Christians.

Spirituality Column #362
October 22, 2013
Current in Carmel-Westfield-Noblesville-Fishers-Zionsville

By Bob Walters
 
Aside from an occasional (and usually linguistically-cloaked) barb, this column avoids day-to-day politics and social controversies.

They detract from the eternal, loving, larger and truer story of Jesus Christ.

And as Jesus tells the multitudes in the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 6:24) and the Pharisees in the Parable of the Shrewd manager (Luke 16:13), that man cannot serve two masters referring to God and money, it seems that no longer can modern culture manage to concurrently serve the two masters of God and politics.

Plenty of other folks besides me can tell you what they think you should think about a government shutdown, the debt ceiling, ObamaCare, politicians in general, Republicans and Democrats in particular, Conservatives, Liberals, the media, economics, civil rights, gay marriage, secular “faiths,” educational platforms, family priorities, global warming, etc.  In all these arenas, political correctness and social agendas outrun divine truths and human freedoms.

We mistakenly subordinate the prayerful inclusion of God to useless political chatter.  Hence, we are trapped in the land of “one or the other.”

Regarding God and politics, you may have noticed, we can only discuss one – publicly and coherently – at a time.  When openly conversing about the great issues of our times – although arguing is more usually the case – Christian perspective, whether it starts out in the mix or not, is quickly swept away.  Typically, the first casualty in a disagreement is sacrificial love.  And what was Jesus Christ all about?  Sacrificial love.

There’s not much Christian perspective left when sacrificial love goes away.

So I find great and enduring comfort in the divine Truth that God never changes, the gracious mission of Jesus Christ never changes, and the light of the Holy Spirit never loses its focus.  God created us and gave us life, Jesus Christ saved us and gave us His life, and the Holy Spirit illuminates these truths in our hearts, minds and souls.

That’s not to say we should never be upset by the treachery of political spin, secular educational agendas, media disingenuousness, government fraud, human greed and the amalgamation of sin toward which practically all of us contribute so mightily and miserably.

But God didn’t create the world to be bad.  God created the world in His image to be good, to be loved by Him, and to glorify Him.  Suppose mankind freely pursued that agenda and insisted that God’s truth – not sectarian, debate-riven church “truth” but the actual, sacrificial-love-of -Christ capital-T Truth – governed public discourse?

Now that would be change I could believe in.

Walters (rlwcom) isn’t fool enough to imagine mankind without political arguments, but He is faithful enough to be assured of the holy single-mindedness of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

Spirituality Column #361

Spirituality Column #360
October 8, 2013
Current in Carmel-Westfield-Noblesville-Fishers-Zionsville