Is God the Author of Confusion? YES and NO. [Part 2]

Continued from Part 1…

“We fear it is hopeless ever to form a society which can keep out men base enough to profess one thing and believe another; but it might be possible to make an informal alliance among all who hold the Christianity of their fathers. Little as they might be able to do, they could at least protest, and as far as possible free themselves of that complicity which will be involved in a conspiracy of silence.” – C. H. Spurgeon

I am compelled to think that it is out of the heaviness of such moments as the one currently weighing down my heart that Paul said the following words:

““People of Athens! I see that in every way you are very religious.For as I walked around and looked carefully at your objects of worship, I even found an altar with this inscription: to an unknown god. So you are ignorant of the very thing you worship—and this is what I am going to proclaim to you.

 “The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by human hands. And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything. Rather, he himself gives everyone life and breath and everything else. From one man he made all the nations, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he marked out their appointed times in history and the boundaries of their lands.God did this so that they would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far from any one of us.‘For in him we live and move and have our being.’ As some of your own poets have said, ‘We are his offspring.’” [Acts 17:22-28]

I am not in any way belittling the importance of acquiring sound theological knowledge. I am just saying that the soundness is inconsequential if it is all sound and no action.  I am not advocating the blind and often self-contradictory “I hate dogmas, but love Jesus” excuse for intellectual laziness. I am simply pointing out that oftentimes our folly is in our misplaced confidence. Christian knowledge is important, but only as a means to a greater end, which is God Himself. My knowledge about God is useless if it does not transform into a knowledge of (and communion with) God. Such confidence in a school of theology may not be very different from the confidence that the builders of the tower of Babel had.

There was nothing wrong with building a tower. As a matter of fact, God-given engineering talent was employed in the work. There was even nothing wrong with wanting to go to heaven. We all want to go to heaven. The problem is that they wanted to reach the heavens without actually obeying God’s revealed will.

If we think of our theological school of thought as the only way to heaven, perhaps we need to be reminded that Jesus came down from heaven to earth, to redeem a fallen humanity, a humanity that could not save itself. Perhaps all I am trying so cautiously to say is that I know some Arminians who live out their theology better than some Calvinists debate their theology. I also know some Calvinists who live out their theology better than some Arminians debate their theology. How do I know this? Not by their eloquence or logical consistency in expressing their dogmas. But by their fruit. Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness and self-control. And against these, there is no law.

I guess what I am trying to do is to echo Paul’s conclusion to the above discourse with the Athenians;

“Therefore since we are God’s offspring, we should not think that the divine being is like gold or silver or stone—an image made by human design and skill.In the past God overlooked such ignorance, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent.For he has set a day when he will judge the world with justice by the man he has appointed. He has given proof of this to everyone by raising him from the dead.” [vs 29-31]

Brian Doerksen, a Canadian Christian singer-songwriter expresses this aptly in the words to his song, “Welcome to the Place of level Ground”:

Welcome to the place of Level ground,
Welcome to the place where grace abounds,
We all need mercy,
We all need mercy,
.
Welcome to the place where none can boast,
Welcome to the place compassion flows,
We all need mercy,
We all need mercy,
.
None of us are worthy on our own,
None of us could keep the perfect Law,
None of us has lived a sinless life,
But thanks be to God,
He sent us all a Savior,
Jesus Christ,
The only God of grace,
Favor and forgiveness flowing down,
Jesus Christ,
Once for all You gave,
Saving us forever trough Your blood,
You are the only God of grace,

.

In His service and for His glory,

Cornell