The Goodness of God

I ended my last post stating that all that we see, even the most beautiful things we see, are broken because of our sin.  And the story of God's redemption, both of of fallen humanity and the broken world we find ourselves in, is the story of the gospel.  But before I talk more about that, the issue of God's goodness needs to be addressed.  For all to often, when people consider the brokenness of the world, the fact that evil exists and the sheer magnitude of that evil, people have a tendency to blame God and/or question His goodness.

Evil is a perplexing issue with good reason.  Anyone who honestly looks at the world has to come to the conclusion that something is wrong.  Suffering and pain are real, and they hurt.  And the level of evil in the world at times reaches very dark low points.  When we look at scripture, we are told when evil entered creation (when Lucifer rebelled against God) but we are not told where it came from (i.e. how evil entered Lucifer's heart and where it was before that).  It is one of those things that God has chosen not to reveal to man.  But what becomes crystal clear is that God is sovereign, that He is in control of everything, and that He is good.

Now, that last sentence really bothers people.  The line of thought goes like this: if He is all powerful (sovereign) and if He is in control of everything, then He cannot be good because He allows pain, suffering, and evil to happen.  As someone who has been through quite a bit of pain and suffering (although admittedly not as much as many) let me tell you why that sentence doesn't bother me.  It doesn't bother me because the more I walk with God, the more I see the darkness and sin in my heart and the holiness and goodness of God.  My heart is a dark, dark place and I am capable of heinous things.  This drives me to the cross of Christ over and over and over again.  And the reality is, contrary to popular opinion, my heart is not abnormal.  The heart of every man, woman and child is heinously evil and capable of sin of monstrous proportions.  For me, the real question isn't, "Why is their evil?" the real question is, "Why is there any good in the world?"  We (humanity) are the problem with evil.  Our lack of understanding about (or unwillingness to acknowledge) our sin nature combined with our societies insatiable appetite for comfort clouds the issue of evil in the minds of most.

Combined with that is our lack of understanding about God.  I think Randy Alcorn puts it best when he says, "Behind almost every human expression of the problem of evil stands the assumption that somehow we know what God should do.  But unlike him, we are not all-knowing, all-wise, all-loving, all-powerful, and perfectly good - so how could we know?  As finite and fallen individuals, how can we presume to judge God?  Compared to him, we know very little, and even that is often distorted.  We simply lack the necessary qualifications to assess what God should or shouldn't do" (The Goodness of God, p 54).  This doesn't minimize the pain and suffering that are in this world.    But it should cause us to stop and think about the fact that we are the problem, not the solution.  Christ is the solution.  And it has been my experience that the presence of pain and suffering in my life magnifies the goodness of God rather than diminishes it.

The Grandeur of God

I just finished Matt Chandler's book The Explicit Gospel and there will be much to come on this blog about that book as it was amazing.  However, there was one point in particular that has been blowing me up a little bit the past few days.  It is a point that I have made on this blog before, but which has been hit home yet again since reading Chandler's book, and that is the immense glory and magnificence of God.  Consider this: man is by nature a creature that creates.  We like to build things.  We like to take raw material and make things that are unique and special.  Whether it is taking wood and making a cabinet or arranging a house in such a way that people say, "Wow," we like to create.  Yet we are limited in our creativity by the material we have present.  For instance.  I like to make things out of wood.  Despite the fact that I am limited by my lack of expertise, I am limited by the material I have at hand.  The same is true for "expert" wood workers.  They too are limited by the amount of raw material they have on hand.  Yet consider this (and this is the point Chandler made): God has no such limitation.  God created everything out of nothing (the technical term is ex nihilo).  This fact has been pounded home because my wife and I are currently on a vacation.  Today we took a drive along the "Grand Canyon of the Pacific" and then hiked (a legit, 2000 ft vertical in 3 miles hike) to the Napali Coast.  Cliffs soar out of the ocean and the pictures do not do justice.  For instance, find the helicopter in one of these three pictures... in fact, I'll even tell you it is in the picture that look looks like the Grand Canyon... good luck).  But everything I saw today was created by God out of nothing!!  It's not like He had rocks and said, "Hmmm, let's make a planet and then make a canyon." No, he created the rock itself, and then everything else that makes it look so amazing from nothing. Let that sink in a little and blow you up.  And then let this sink in.... everything I saw today (in the pictures below).... is broken because of our sin.  More to come on that later.

Thoughts on "The Explicit Gospel"

"The religious, moralistic, churchgoing evangelical who has no real intention of seeking God and following him has not found some sweet spot between radical devotion and wanton sin; he's found devastation.  The moralism that passes for Christian faith today is a devastating hobby if you have no intention of submitting your life fully to God and chasing him in Christ." ~ Matt Chandler

I have been reading Matt Chandler's first book, The Explicit Gospel, for the past few days and have been blown away and floored more than I can recount in this blog.  For those of you who have heard him preach, his writing style is very similar to his preaching, that is, blunt and to the point.  His book focuses on the gospel from two vantage points, the ground level (i.e. the individual) and the "30,000 foot level" (i.e. all of creation) and has a section at the end that has some practical implications and dangers of spending all of our energy focused on one aspect and not taking the entire, "explicit," gospel into account.

I am currently half way through the "30,000 foot level" section, but could not wait to finish the book to share a few thoughts, specifically about the "ground level" section.  Chandler focuses on the gospel at the ground level in terms of God, Man, Christ, and Response.  The quote above has really stuck with me since I read it.  Probably because I live and work in a sphere so influenced by moralism.  But this quote really got emphatically pounded home by two other points that Chandler made.  First, we don't properly understand the severity and kindness of God and second, we don't often realize or think about the fact that the gospel ALWAYS elicit's a response.  The Gospel always brings about either "hatred or passion" toward Jesus Christ (ambivalence towards the gospel is just veiled hatred, let's be honest).  

The severity and kindness of God "both come from his (God's) perfect and holy self-sufficiency, and they are both extended justly to his creation, but the chief difference between them - and the reason we don't talk about it as much - is that only severity is deserved" (Chandler).  We don't often think about God's severity towards our sinfulness.  We don't fear God as we should.  This is the only explanation for how people can play the moralistic religious game.  Also, we don't understand that the gospel ALWAYS elicits a response.  This is because it is God who elicits that response to His word.  People are either hardened to the gospel or drawn too it, there is no in between.

We must stop playing silly religious games.  Religion, our ability to conform ourselves to a social or behavioral norm, has never and will never save.  Christ and only Christ can save.  

Easter

For the past several months I have been hooked on reading the Puritans, primarily John Owen.  Although today at the book store I bought several other books in the "Puritan Paperback" series by authors other than Owen.  My reading of Owen, and my perusal of the others, has left me with two deep impressions.  First, the Puritans, perhaps more than any other group in Church history, understood the holiness and glory of God, and longed to see Him more than life itself.  Secondly, they had a better understanding of the natural state of man than most modern minds, especially most modern psychologists, for they understood the sinful nature of man better than anyone I have ever read outside of Scripture (for example, I just bought a 284 page, small font book entitled, The Sinfulness of Sin).

These two thoughts have converged for me this Easter season.  Everyone loves Easter.  Tomorrow most of America, with the exception of the staunchest atheists, will head to church.  Little boys and girls will be dressed up in their spring best, there will be flowers and hats and smiles all around, and meals will be shared with family and friends as kids pass out from a sugar buzz.  And I fear that for most of America, including professing Evangelical America, this will be the extent of it.  The implications of the cross and resurrection of Christ will be lost on most because we don't understand God, and we don't understand how wicked we are that the Son of God had to suffer and die to pay a debt we couldn't bear.

In his new book, The Explicit Gospel, Matt Chandler says, "The work of God in the cross of Christ strikes us as awe-inspiring only after we have first been awed by the glory of God."  Honestly, when was the last time you sat down and thought about the nature and character of God in an attempt to comprehend His glory?  When in life have you been awed by the glory of God?  Let me put that another way, consider for a moment how little you actually know about God and how big He actually is.  John Owen puts it this way, "Will not a due apprehension of the inconceivable greatness of God, and the infinite distance in which we stand from Him, fill our souls with a holy and awful fear of Him?"  Everyone loves the thought of Easter because rather than filling them with a good and holy fear (there is such a thing as good fear) it numbs them to the reality that Easter is all about how holy God is and how awful we are.  

Think about it for a minute, we are celebrating the fact that God came to earth and lived as a man, he suffered horribly and died substitutionary death because we are so wicked that we cannot be in the presence of God unless He did something to fix it.  We are so sinful that when the holy, perfect Son of God walked on earth, the righteous people killed Him.  We are so sinful that we celebrate the ultimate sacrifice of the Son of God while making light of the reason He had to die, our wickedness.  

The more I read scripture, and the more I read great saints of old, and the longer I live the more I am realizing that walking closer with God doesn't mean that I feel better about myself as a person.  No, all it means is that in the light of Truth, I will see more clearly who I really am, and when I the Truth exposes the darkness that dwells in me, the grace of Christ is magnified all the more.  Grace becomes tangible and Christ is glorified as sufficient for everything.  

May this Easter be one in which Christ draws you near and magnifies Himself in your life, that He may become more and we may become less.