As I’ve been reading through the Gospels I have written down all the things Jesus has said that alarm me. I’m just over halfway through Luke and I already have a list of more than 60 phrases or parables Jesus has told that I must come to terms with in some way—and that’s assuming that I may have skimmed over things that are actually alarming without really thinking about them. I won’t be writing about all 60+ instances, but, as you can tell by the title, this will be a discussion I plan to revisit more than once. So let’s dive into the words of Jesus that compelled me to write today: Then [Jesus] told this parable: “A man had a fig tree growing in his vineyard, and he went to look for fruit on it but did not find any. So he said to the man who took care of the vineyard, ‘For three years now I’ve been coming to look for fruit on this fig tree and haven’t found any. Cut it down! Why should it use up the soil?’ ‘Sir,’ the man replied, ‘leave it alone for one more year, and I’ll dig around it and fertilize it. If it bears fruit next year, fine! If not, then cut it down.’” Luke 13:6-9 “He answered, ‘Then I beg you, father, send Lazarus to my family, for I have five brothers. Let him warn them, so that they will not also come to this place of torment.’ Abraham replied, ‘They have Moses and the Prophets; let them listen to them.’ ‘No, father Abraham,’ he said, ‘but if someone from the dead goes to them, they will repent.’ He said to him, ‘If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.’” Luke 16:27-31 These verses are alarming to me. God is patient with us. He forbears punishment from us so that we may have time to bear fruit. He has given us everything we need—Moses and the Prophets—to teach us about God that we may repent and turn to Him. But He does not wait forever. His patience, kindness, and forbearance have only one purpose. “Or do you show contempt for the riches of his kindness, forbearance and patience, not realizing that God’s kindness is intended to lead you to repentance?” Romans 2:4 God is so good! He gives us our whole lives to turn to Him! Though we deserve punishment from the beginning, he gives us all of our years on earth to listen to Moses and the Prophets and turn to Him and repent. What alarms me is that this is not why most modern people praise God. People lift their hands to Him in thanks for His forgiveness without turning from their sins. They praise Him for every good thing and curse Him when things don’t go their way. They envision that a good God is one who saves all people, no matter how they live or what they do. But God is only kind to us so that we may repent. If we continue to live in our sin, similar to a fig tree which does not bear fruit, we will be cut down. “But unless you repent, you too will all perish.” Luke 13:5b Even more alarming, we hear these things and they don’t compel us. I grew up in church. I have only ever gone to Christian schools. I have spent the entirety of my life surrounded by Moses and the Prophets and I didn’t submit to God until 2 months ago. How terrifying it is to think that our hearts might be hard—that though we hear things, understanding is not yet given to us. Even the disciples experienced this when Jesus Himself told them that He would die. “But they did not understand what this meant. It was hidden from them, so that they did not grasp it, and they were afraid to ask him about it.” Luke 9:45 This brings me back to a previous post, Misunderstanding, where my unbelieving friend was questioning why God doesn’t just appear in front of us to tell us that He’s real. Then we’d surely repent, right? Apparently not, according to Jesus. Even if a dead man raised back to life to tell us to repent we would not be convinced if Moses and the Prophets had not already convinced us. This was crazy to me at first, but it has begun to make more sense as I meditate on it more and more. If our hearts are hard, God Himself could slap us in the face and we still wouldn’t repent. We cannot get to God on our own. We just can’t. God decides when our hearts will soften. It’s not up to us. Even if we read the Bible cover to cover and studied its every word, doing an exegesis on each passage, we still wouldn’t understand if God did not soften our hearts. Does that seem cruel? To make it so that we can never get to Him on our own? We are told to submit to God’s authority. We are also told to lean not on our own understanding (Proverbs 3:5-6) and to realize that God’s thoughts and ways are infinitely higher than ours (Isaiah 55:8-9). Everything happens in His timing. If it happened in our timing, it wouldn’t be submission. Submission involves accepting that you don’t get to make the big decisions, and you also don’t get to understand why each big decision was made. Are you willing to submit to a God who decides your fate and who determines whether or not you can understand? "Seek the Lord while he may be found; call on him while he is near. Let the wicked forsake their ways and the unrighteous their thoughts. Let them turn to the Lord, and he will have mercy on them, and to our God, for he will freely pardon.” Isaiah 55:6-7 Submit to God. Repent and be baptized. Pray that the Holy Spirit opens the eyes of your heart. If you are fervent, and if God wills, you will understand enough in God’s timing.
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AuthorFighting complacency and advocating change in myself for the world around me. Posts by Date
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