13. Tough
Question #13: Reluctant God.
Why was God so reluctant to sacrifice
Himself for your sins?
To
start you need to realize that there is a difference between God the Father and
God the Son and God the Spirit. The
Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit act in complete unison according to the
will of God. Therefore the bible tells
us “…The Lord is our God. The Lord is
one!” (Duet. 6:4) When you praise the
Father, you praise the Son; when you blaspheme the Son, you blaspheme the
Father; when you call on the Spirit, you call on the Father and the Son. However, we see that from the beginning, God
is one AND God is the trinity. (Gen.
1:2, 26 see also John 10:30 & John 1:1-3, 14) In your web video you say: “He knew Adam and Eve would fall, and he
knew that the only way he could forgive sin would be if he sacrificed himself –
to himself.” He did not sacrifice
Himself to Himself. The Son forsook His
communion with the Father and the Spirit, took on flesh with all its frailties,
lived blameless in the will of God, and then allowed Himself to be sacrificed
for the sake of mankind. (Phil. 2:6-8 see also Rom. 8:3) The bible makes clear from the beginning that
the only payment for sin is blood; your own blood. Someone else’s blood will not cover for your
misdeeds, since they have sin of their own.
The blood of animals (who do not have free will) could only grant a
temporary stay of judgment, not cleansing.
So, what is the solution to bridge the gap that mankind has made? The solution is: blood from one who is
sinless AND has free will of His own.
Only God is both. Only the Son
was able. This also answers your comments:
“The day before he is to die, he goes and
prays to himself and begs himself to get himself out. “God please remove this cup from me.” “Please, let me out of it, I don’t want to do
this.”…and… Why after he
was here did he beg himself to let himself off the hook?” Jesus did not
pray to Himself, he prayed to the Father.
Knowing He must do this thing in order to fulfill the will of God did
not make it any more appealing. The Lord
teaches us in His word that He can be persuaded. He can change His mind. Jesus prayed to the Father to change His mind
or possibly find another way. He did not
want to disobey the Father, but He also did not want to be tortured to
death. Can you blame Him?
You
also say: “If your God is not a reluctant
God, why did he wait 4,000 years before coming down and offering Himself as a
sacrifice? Why not do it immediately?
There was
no need, and no benefit to waiting 4,000 years and issuing laws that he’s just
going repeal later.” When God created Adam he did not immediately
create Eve. He had Adam see all the
animals first (and name them), so that Adam would understand that “…there was
not found a helper suitable for him.” (Gen. 2:20). God knew that He would be making woman, and
that it was not good for man to be alone.
But Adam needed time to realize it too, in order to appreciate the gift
that was his wife. In the same way,
mankind needed time to appreciate the destructive force of sin and understand
what it means to be separated from God.
The bible tells us that the old law was a tutor to lead us to
Christ. (Gal. 3:24) It taught us why a perfect sacrifice was
needed. Man could not be holy without
the help of God. Man could not be
reconciled to God without His help. So
in answer to: “And why did he try so many
other plans before finally deciding that the only way he could do it would be
to come down himself?” He had only
one plan (Gen. 3:15), the law brought us to it and taught us why we needed it. The old law was not discarded or “repealed”,
but fulfilled. (Matt. 5:17-18)
You
say: “He knows all. He knows the past, the present, and the
future. He knows the outcome of every
decision anyone will ever make.
In
fact, the entire history of the world was known to God before he even created
it.”
You do not believe that God is omniscient because according to you, He
would have done things differently or on a different timetable. I have two things to respond to that; the
first is that God has His own timetable and His own counsels, and as GOD, He
can make the right decision. (Isa. 55:8-9 – “For My thoughts are not your
thoughts, neither are your ways My ways,” declares the Lord. “For as the heavens are higher than the
earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your
thoughts.”) The second is that He is
long-suffering and gives man lots of time to repent, in hopes that He can
reconcile with him. (II Pet. 3:9)
Lastly,
let me tell you something about my son.
He loves chocolate ice cream in a cone.
I know anytime I ask him what kind of ice cream he wants, he will always
respond, “chocolate in a cone”. Because
I know this, and I know him so well, I can predict his answer. He is still free to choose any flavor. He can get a cup or a cone. But I know what he will choose. Is God any less insightful? He knew when He created man that he would
sin. For the sake of love, God created
us anyway, and warned man of the consequences of sin, but sure enough, man
sinned anyway. Did God force man to sin
just because He knew the outcome? Again,
for the sake of love, God had a plan of redemption and He knew that most men
would reject it. He predicted it; He set
it in motion; and sure enough, it was fulfilled! Were there no choices? Could man have chosen not to sin? Yes, but he didn’t, and God knew he
wouldn’t. Could Jesus have chosen not to
come to earth? Could Jesus have rejected
the Father’s plan and decided to leave us to deal with the consequences of our
own actions? These things could have
happened, but the Father knows the Son.
He knew that what He planned, the Son would fulfill.
14. Tough Question for Christians #14: Kill your
kids for Christ
Would you risk eternity in Hell if it
would guarantee your children would spend eternity in Heaven?
I
have two sons. They both crawled at 6
months. But the eldest didn’t walk until
he was almost 15 months, and the youngest was tottering around by his first
birthday. My first born didn’t say a
word until he was more than 27 months old, my baby is a jabber-jaws at 18
months. My point is, they are alike as
brothers are, but they are also very different, including in the area of
development. At what point will they be
old enough to be accountable to God? It
will be when they have committed sin.
(“For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God,” as you so
often like to quote.) There is not an
age or a demarcation line. There is an
action. Once my boys are old enough to
understand the difference in good and evil, once they have committed an act
that will separate them from God, they are accountable to Him for that act. At what point will that be? Only God knows. But although my boys have the potential to
one day do evil, they also have the potential to one day do good. Should I kill them now and rob the world of 2
souls potential good? What sort of faith
will these boys have? I think they have
enormous potential to do enormous good and show enormous faith! I hope and pray that at least one of them is
a preacher. Perhaps their faith will
lead thousands to Christ. Perhaps it
will lead one soul to Christ. Either way
that is tremendous good. That is one
more soul. I would “risk” my boys souls
that they would one day bring about a better world and the joy of salvation to
others. After all, if I kill my kids for
Christ, I don’t really have faith in Him to save my boys through His plan of
salvation, do I?
It
is a good thing that God doesn’t think like you. After all, if He just killed off all the
faithful people to take them to heaven, then he would have left all the sinners
on earth, and just taken Noah and his family to be with him. He would have taken Abram, and we’d have no
father Abraham. He would have taken
David, and the Jews would never have had their greatest king. What a great loss for the rest of the world
that would have been! Not to mention
that “without faith it is impossible to please [God].” (Heb. 11:6)
Faith is an action. Noah had to
prove his faith by building the ark.
Abraham had to prove his faith on several occasions, including the
sacrifice of his son. All the great men
and women of the bible had to ACT on their belief in God, and it was credited
to them as faith! (Heb. 11) If they had
died as children how could they have shown their faith? How could they have shown us?
15. Tough Question for Christians #15: Amputees
Why aren’t you reattaching limbs for the
glory of God?
This
question assumes that the promised signs given by Jesus in Mark 16:17-18 to his
disciples just before he ascended to heaven was an unending promise to all
believers. It also assumes that God
promised that miraculous gifts would continue as long as the church
remained. I believe that neither assumption
is true. Jesus gives his apostles lots
of authority that was necessary for the establishment of the church and the
spreading of the gospel that we no longer have or need today. They were promised (and received) the “fire”
of the Holy Spirit (Matt. 3:11 for the prophecy, Acts 2:1-4 for the fulfillment),
but we understand that was for them at that time to establish the church. They were given the authority to “bind” and
“loose” on earth and in heaven (Matt. 16:19), but we understand that authority
was given to the apostles alone, not to all believers. I contend that the
promised signs in Mark 16 were also limited to time and persons. God tells us through His word that He would
eventually end miraculous signs. (See I
Cor. 13. For more about this, see my
answer to question #8.) I believe the
bible teaches that God is not talking to people directly today, that is why He
gives us His word. Don't get me wrong, it's not that God can't work modern day miracles, but I believe the scriptures teach
that He won't. And God being God,
wouldn't break His own rules. I believe very much in the providence of God: His
actions through the natural world that bring about goodness in the lives of the
faithful. Prayer is an important
component of that sort of providence. I know that there are lots of people out
there who would disagree with me on this, but all I've ever seen of people who
allegedly have miraculous gifts are men who are looking to receive money, power
and praise for themselves, not glorify God.
And on that point I would agree with you, if miraculous gifts
continue in present day, where are all the healed people?
Read and post comments |
Send to a friend
]]>
I was really surprised and amazed. I was laughing with him when he
looked up to me and smiled and eventually laughed. But then after a
really short while, my laughter gave way to tears. Tears of
unexplainable happiness that I could not contain. I guess moms live for
these moments. I hugged my son real tight and told him I love him no
matter what. I sealed that moment with a kiss on his forehead and both
fell asleep.