Unbeliever’s Objection Part II

Have you ever thought. or perhaps are currently wondering….

“If God is loving, how can he let anyone go to hell?”

But if we are going to talk about this properly, let me reword your objection.

“Since man is good by nature, he deserves to be happy forever. So why does God send him to hell.”

Objector: “Woah woah woah, I never said that.”

Me: Actually, you did.

The nature of man

52% of evangelicals in the USA would agree that man is good by nature according to this years State of Theology survey (f you don’t believe me go check out http://stateoftheology.com/), so I’m not surprising the unbelieving world is confused about why God sends people to hell. We can’t even get it right in the church.

Christians and non-Christians alike insist on puffing up the self-esteem of man, asserting that although people may sin, deep down, they are good. We tell people to “just do you boo boo”. Evangelicals tell unrepentant sinners that their goodness is just being overshadowed by sin as if it is something separate to who they really are.

The unconditionally love of God has somehow been translated to mean “it doesn’t matter if you sin, God loves you just the way you are.”

HERESY!

Perhaps you’ve heard it put like this, “God really hates the sin not the sinner”

Really?

Last time I read the Bible I saw countless scriptures that say God HATES evildoers Psalm 5:5.

And aside from scripture lets just think about this logically: if God just hated the sin,  then why would God send the sinner to hell and not just the sin?

Because they are inseparable!

I’m not surprised that people are so confused about the doctrine of hell!

CHRISTIAN, YOU ARE NOT HELPING!!!!

Thankfully, the answers we do need are found in the Bible. When we read the full counsel of scripture we can determine whether man is good and just makes bad decisions because of the evil that is somewhat external to his true nature, or whether man is truly evil at the core and therefore sin is just the outward evidence of his inward state.

Let’s look at the text

The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it – Jeremiah 17:9

At first glance you might not think this is a ‘deal breaker’ kind of text. But upon further examination of the original language a whole new meaning is found:

“Heart” (Hebrew lebab/leb [b’bel], Gk. kardia [kardiva]) occurs over one thousand times in the Bible, making it the most common anthropological term in the Scripture. It denotes a person’s center for both physical and emotional-intellectual-moral activities. – Bible Study Tools retrieved from https://www.biblestudytools.com/dictionary/heart/

So with this in mind, this verse is telling us that the center of man’s being is deceitful and desperately sick. Let’s keep looking….

“For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out.”- Romans 7:18

Does this say that man has some good and some bad in him? The Apostle Paul who was arguable the godliest man there was (not including Jesus), says nothing good was in him. This is a man who was entrusted by God, by the power of the Holy Spirit, to write 13 of the 27 books that make up the New Testament, and he said that nothing good was in him. How do you think you and I measure up?

If you still aren’t convinced you can apply this to all men, when we continue reading, it becomes pretty clear that Paul intend for us to apply this to all men:

“the mind set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God’s law; indeed, it cannot. Those who are in the flesh cannot please God.” Romans 8:7-8.

Paul is backing up what the Prophet Jeremiah said in the OT; man is sick. He has no good in him. He cannot please God.

“None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God. All have turned aside; together they have become worthless; no one does good, not even one.” Romans 3:10

There it is again….

“For from within, out of the heart of man, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, coveting, wickedness, deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride, foolishness. All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person.”Mark 7:21-23

You do not sin because of external things. It is not society’s fault. It is not your annoying co-workers fault. It is not just because you are having a bad day. It comes from within you.

“The LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great on the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.”– Genesis 6:5

Society says “man is good” but God says “every intent is only evil continually.”

But you really think things changed when you were born?

“sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned… by the one man’s disobedience the many were made sinners” Romans 5:12,19

Guess not!

This a fundamental Christian doctrine; the fall of Adam and the doctrine of original sin.

“We are not sinners because we sin, we sin because we are sinners” – R C Sproul

“For there is no truth in their mouth; their inmost self is destruction; their throat is an open grave; they flatter with their tongue.” Psalm 5:9

Have I made my point?

Some people question why I harp on about the sinful nature of man so much and I hope after reading this I hope you can see why

IT IS EVERYWHERE

Old and New Testament

Multiple books

Multiple verses

And this is not even an exhaustive list.

Go and check this out if you still aren’t convinced: http://traviscarden.com/total-depravity-verse-list#

When you open the pages of the Bible and read scripture for any length of time you will not be able to deny the total depravity of man if you desire to be faithful to God’s word.

I once was told how special I was, how God saved me because He had such an amazing purpose for my life and I was told that I was not the real problem. It was just this fallen world we live in and I just needed to turn to Jesus to make all my problems go away. If I turned to Jesus, I could have everything great in this world .

And surprise surprise, my life never changed. I never felt a discomfort toward my sin because I was just constantly told how awesome I was and how God just wanted me to be happy, healthy and wealthy.

Until one day I was confronted, by the Bible.

I remember sitting in my living room, weeping over the pages of scripture because I realized who I really was.

From that moment on my life changed.

Totally dead in sin. Totally rebellious. Totally depraved.

Can I just take this opportunity to talk to my Christian friends who get uncomfortable talking about sin and just think we need to ‘love’ people more to share the gospel……Brothers and sisters, when we downplay the depravity of man (or leave it out completely) we eliminate the need for a savior and any reason for life change.

Jesus did not die just so you can make people feel good about themselves.

You are cheapening the good news.

Jesus said it best

You might think I’m being a bit harsh. You’re probably rolling your eyes thinking I’m just another one of those crazy Bible bashing folks who wants to yell “YOU’RE A SINNER” at random people on the street.

“You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father’s desires.”

These aren’t my words or the words of a theologian. They are not the words of that crazy guy with a megaphone and a sign that says “REPENT OR BURN” on the side of the road.

This is straight from John 8:44. And who was speaking?

JESUS!

Who was he speaking to?

Those who refused to believe in their need for Him to save them from their desperate wickedness.

He is telling the unbelieving people that they are of the devil and not of God. That by nature they are child of wrath, and their will is to that which is opposite to God.

He isn’t telling them “you are so wonderful, please come and follow me because you are just so great and I want you to come and be my disciple.”

Jesus does not save people because they are inherently good, but in spite of the fact that they are not!

The Good News

“but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” Romans 5:8

And Jesus answered them, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I have not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance.” Luke 5:31-32

“And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience-among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath like the rest of mankind. But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ…. By grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.” Ephesians 2:1-5,8-9

“He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.” Colossians 1:13-14

“And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses, by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. This he set aside, nailing it to the cross.” Colossians 2:13

“But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, he saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that being justified by his grace we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life.” Titus 3:4-8

My Final Plea

God could have left us in our sinfulness and justly chosen to send every single one of us to hell because we are sinners by nature. BUT being rich in mercy and grace He didn’t. Instead He did what you and I cannot do: He came into this world, and lived the perfect life to atone for the past present and future sins of His sheep. He was beaten and hung on a cross so that whosoever believes on Him would be spared.

“For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.” 2 Corinthians 5:21

For a moment, just stop and think about a God who would willingly take the place of sinners so that those who believe in Him for their salvation, would inherit eternal life.

Can’t you see that the objection that God is not loving because sinners go to hell is fundamentally flawed when we understand who we are? When we truly understand what Christ did in spite of who we are?

The truth is that God is SO LOVING, that there are some whom He will give eternal life.

He owes us nothing yet chose to give us the greatest gift of all!

If we truly understand our depravity, our only response should be to fall on our face in worship.

My unbelieving friends, don’t wait another minute, repent and believe to be saved from what you deserve. You are not promised tomorrow.

“If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” 1 John 1:9

Saints, share the WHOLE gospel, just like Christ did.

Until next time, God willing

Natasha

The Unbeliever’s Objections Part I

“If there was a God, why would they allow innocent people to suffer? I would hate to think that someone or something can control and allow that to happen!”

I once had this objection. I refused to believe in a God who was all knowing and all powerful and all loving, yet did nothing to stop all the innocent people from suffering in this world.

Travelling to Tanzania at 18 years old was where it all started for me. Stepping outside of my ‘Bahrain bubble life’ and travelling to a third world country was a catalyst of sorts. As someone who had never really contemplated the meaning of life, Africa made me wonder.

You think you’re prepared mentally, you’ve watched Comic Relief once or twice, you’ve seen the UNICEF videos, but nothing can prepare you for what you will actually experience.

This might sound like a cliche, but travelling to Tanzania was life changing!

I met people who had ‘nothing’ by western culture standards. I met children who were in an orphanage because they had been abandoned purely because their mothers were either too sick or too poor to care for them. It was not an unusual occurrence to see children that could not have been more than 12 years old, farming with a child strapped to their backs.

I saw how simple things made Tanzanian children so excited; they would use a stick and paint can lids that were left over from our work site to make what resembled a yardstick wheel. They would take it in turns to push it around for entertainment. The little things brought them so much joy. You couldn’t help but feel ashamed of your ungratefulness for all the things in your own life.

I will never forget what happened on the last day of our service project. Not thinking anything of it, I took my gloves off and  passed them to one of the kids that followed us around daily knowing I would probably never need them again. I didn’t realize how big a deal this was until I saw the crowd begin to gather. I was swarmed by 20+ children of the village, all trying to get the gloves for themselves.

Gloves that I gave no second thought to and was ready to just throw away, became a treasure worth fighting over for these children.

Being in the midst of severe poverty made me wonder why my life was different.

“Why do I get to have so much more than these children? How is this fair?”

In my mind the only thing that was different to me and these children was that I just so happened to have been born into a white family on a different continent.

Why were they suffering and I wasn’t?

An Atheistic world view

I had always seen myself as someone who had been a ‘good person’ most of my life. I had worked hard at school, been kind to people and done some nice things (like go on this community service trip to Tanzania to help build a school for the town of Moshi).

Sure, I had made some bad decision: I had disobeyed my parents, I had broken rules, I talked back to teachers, I had been mean to people because they annoyed me. But I wasn’t THAT bad really.

In my eyes, I was innocent. And so were the people of Moshi.

I didn’t state it explicitly, but my true complaint was that people were experiencing an injustice in the world and therefore God couldn’t be real. If God was real and knew that this was happening, then He was either all powerful and not loving or he was loving and not all powerful. I could not see how there could be a God worth worshiping based on what I saw.

These innocent people didn’t deserve to suffer this kind of life, yet God did NOTHING to stop it. They weren’t ‘bad people’ so how could God allow this? There was just no way.

In my mind I thought I had totally debunked the Atheist/theist debate once and for all, as if no theist had ever thought of this questions *face palm*

The bigger question

Years went by and in the busyness of life, I soon found other things to occupy my mind other than that little town I visited in Sub-Saharan Africa… until I became a Christian.

The question of innocence and why people were still suffering in the world was once again at the forefront of my mind.

Why had I been dealt a different hand of cards in my relatively stress free, white, western, privileged life?

I began to examine my world views against scripture and soon enough I had my answer. Scripture forced me to consider a different question….

Are there any completely innocent people in this world?

And if so, what absolute moral standard are we comparing them to?

Through His eyes

I soon realised that all along I had been comparing my actions (and others) to a moral standard that I had established within myself and perhaps also from my surrounding influences such as family and culture. Ultimately, I was judging everything through my own eyes and what I believed was right or wrong based on no absolute objective standard.

I was using my subjective moral standards to decide whether God was right to allow suffering or not.

My REAL objection as an Atheist was that God was wrong to allow the suffering of  people who were innocent based on a standard I had set.

But when I actually thought about this objection logically, I realised that it was  nonsensical. How could I hold God to my standards? I had it totally flip-flopped

If we consider a God of the universe, then simple logic would put that God as the judge of that universe. Therefore determining whether someone is innocent must be based on HIS standard, not my own.

So what are God’s standards? I began to compare myself to some of the basics….

God: “You shall not murder” (Exodus 20:13)

Me: Ok God, I’ve got that one down! NEXT

God: “You shall not commit adultery” (Exodus 20:14)

Me: Well I’m not married so I’m good I think……Next

God: “You shall not steal” (Exodus 20:15)

Me: I’m pretty sure I’m doing well there….but wait, does that pencil I borrowed from my friend at school, count? The one I realised I didn’t give back to her and just kept it for myself?….surely that can’t count……..next

God: “You shall not bear false witness against your neighbour” (Exodus 20:16)

Me: Oh…..well…..I don’t think I’ve done that…. white lies don’t count do they?…….What about exaggerations?….

God: “You shall not covet your neighbor’s house; you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or his male servant, or his female servant, or his ox, or his donkey, or anything that is your neighbor’s.” (Exodus 20:17) -covet means ‘to yearn to possess’, similar to jealousy)

Me: I’m not jealous per se…. whats wrong with wanting more for my life? We all want that God…..

God: “You shall not take the name of the LORD your God in vain” (Exodus 20:7)

(“This doesn’t just refer to a certain tone of voice or a certain use of the word. It’s dealing with God and speaking of God in a way that empties him of his significance”- John Piper)

Me: …….

Jesus summarized the 10 commandments like this:

“’Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment.  And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’” Matthew 22:37-39

Me: …….

As I contemplated the fact that there over 600 commands in the Old Testament alone and I couldn’t even keep 1% of them, I began to realise scripture was right about me….

“-for there is noone who does not sin” 2 Chronicles 6:36

“There is none who does good, not even one.” Psalm 14:3

“Surely there is not a righteous man on earth who does good and never sins.” Ecclesiastes 7:20

“for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” Romans 3:23

Scripture was clear

In God’s eyes there are no innocent people

A God of Justice

God by His nature is just, meaning he always acts according to what is morally right and fair. He does this based on the standards He has set! He is the absolute moral standard because He is the creator of the Universe.

He does not judge by what you and I think is right or wrong, but by what He does.

Only the creator of the heavens and the earth, the one who knows the beginning from the end, knows what is right.

And He commands perfect holiness.

I agree with my atheist friends, if there was a God who would allow innocent people to suffer I would not believe in Him let alone worship Him.

But there are no innocent people compared to the perfect holiness of God.

When we understand that compared to God, there are NO innocent people, the objection that there are ‘innocent people suffering’ soon diminishes.

To my atheist friends, hear me when I say this to you: in your life you are experiencing the mercy and grace of God every single day! The breath that you have is more than you deserve because you have turned from the One who gave you that breath. You did nothing to create yourself and you are not numbering your days, God is, yet you refuse to give Him the honor and praise He deserves.

That job you love, that hobby you enjoy, that vacation that gave you amazing memories, the loved ones you have around you… those things that you are #grateful for but don’t give the gratitude to anyone in particular…..THOSE are just a few examples of the mercies of God and He deserves the gratitude!

Friends, if God never gave you another thing He deserves gratitude. Even if He took everything you have away, and you had to live like the people of Moshi yet He spared your life, you would still be getting more than you deserve and He would deserve honor and praise.

A Christian world view

The desire to go back to Africa one day is still in my heart but my purpose for going has changed. I no longer hope to alleviate the suffering of this world by giving them food that perishes, but to share the food that endures to eternal life. (John 6:27)

As a Christian I no longer look at Tanzania as a country that is suffering unjustly. Instead I see a people who have graciously been given a life and chance to hear the gospel!

“Jesus said to them, “I am the bread of life; whoever comes to me shall not hunger, and whoever believes in me shall never thirst.” “Whoever feeds on this bread will live forever.”” (John 6:35, 58)

Saints, let us go and share the good news!

Until next time friends….God willing

Love Natasha

A New Definition of Insanity

“Why do you believe the Bible?”

Have you ever been asked this question? Have you ever asked yourself this question?

I truly believe the reason so many of us, including myself, struggle to make time to read the Bible everyday, is because we don’t really understand why we are reading it.

We know that we “should” read it.

But WHY??

“Because it is the life manual God has given us to know how to live”

“Because it’s the way you know God’s promises so that you have hope.”

“Because it’s the way you get to learn about how much God loves you.”

“Because it’s the way you learn about who Jesus was.”

All these answers are common and correct.

But I can still ask you…Why the Bible?

A sea of literature

If I search “self help books for women” on Amazon I get over 50,000 hits.

50,000!!!!!

So why out of 50,000 books should you read the Bible as a life manual, as a source of hope and as a way to feel worthy?

What about all the other religious books out there? Why don’t they tell you about who God is?

Did you know there are about 71 verses in the Quran that mention Jesus? So why not read that to learn about who Jesus was?

The answer is simple

Because every word of the Bible was breathed out by the only God of this universe and we have been instructed not to add or take away from it.

“All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.” 2 Timothy 3:16

“I warn everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: if anyone adds to them, God will add to him the plagues described in this book, and if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God will take away his share in the tree of life and in the holy city, which are described in this book.” Revelation 22:18-19

The Bible is not just a collection of stories to help you navigate through life.

The Bible is not just something to make you feel good about yourself.

The Bible is not just useful information.

The Bible is the very word of God. Literally meaning: we have the book that contains everything that God has spoken and wants us to know about Him and why we exist.

‘Tash, aren’t you going to give us some long theological argument about the accuracy of the Bible or how it was put together or the proof as to why we know it’s the word of God?’

No I’m not.

Because I do not read the Bible because of evidence from theologians and scholars (although there is PLENTY) or because of archaeological facts (although there are PLENTY of those too).

I read the Bible because I KNOW that it is the word of God.

How do I know this?

“Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might understand the things freely given us by God. And we impart this in words not taught by human wisdom but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual truths to those who are spiritual. The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned. The spiritual person judges all things, but is himself to be judged by no one. “For who has understood the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?” But we have the mind of Christ.” 1 Corinthians 2:12-16

What does this scripture mean?

The things of God cannot be explained with logically human reasoning. Evidence is great, but man in himself will never accept the things of God, they will always be foolish to him. But the one who has been regenerated by the Spirit believes in God’s truth because God gives him understanding! In our spiritual rebirth (John 3:3-8), we have been given the mind of Christ to understand the things of the Spirit.

So, if you believe the Bible is the word of God, it is because of God that you believe that! It is not because you are smarter than someone else and you were able to figure it out and choose to believe. God enabled you to understand!

So rather than laying out a debate as to why the Bible is the word of God, like I was going to before I listened to a sermon on this very topic by John Macarthur which you can watch too https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SE7d7QEeVks&t=789s, I give God all the glory!

I believe it because He makes me believe.

If someone asked you to explain why you believe in the Bible, what would you say?

“That’s how I was raised”?

“Because it’s really helped me in my life to make some good decisions.”?

“Because I saw all the evidence and knew that it was the most strongly supported choice.”?

We ought to say, “Because God has given me the Holy Spirit and so I believe the Bible.”

Are you insane??

Sisters, please do not just say amen and go back to your normal routine of sporadically reading your Bibles.

If we really understand this incredible truth, we must begin to understand that as Christians, the Bible is how we hear from God today! God has blessed us with the book! So we must be people of the book.

We must know that we have ALL that we need for completion. We have what we need for EVERY good work.

The words on those pages are alive because HE is alive!

They are active and they are living (Hebrews 4:12).

We have the words of the one and only God of this universe!!!

Yet, we can’t find 5 minutes in our day to read them!

Do you wake up excited to pick up your Bible first thing in the morning?

Or are you more concerned about having time to get your morning coffee?

Or making sure your makeup looks good for work?

Or spending 15 minutes picking out the perfect outfit?

And another 20 minutes scrolling Instagram or Facebook?

Do you drive to work, do your job, come home, hang out, eat and before you even know it, the whole day has gone by without you even thinking about reading your Bible?

This is my new definition of insanity:

“Having the word of God available to feast on daily and choosing not to.”

Ladies, I’m talking to myself too!!!

As I have been thinking about a way to encourage you all to get into the word daily and make time to mediate over the scriptures, all I kept coming back to was this…

Why wouldn’t we read God’s word if we truly believe it’s God’s word?

We read devotionals, we read books about God’s word, we listen to worship music, we pray, we talk to people about God. And these are all WONDERFUL things.

But we don’t find time to hear what God has to say!

We are on the verge of insanity if we live our Christian lives this way.

Let me close with this….

Do you want to hear God speak? Read your Bible.

Do you want to hear God speak audibly? Read it out loud. – Justin Peters.

We have His word, so let us read it, and read it all!

I pray that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding.

Until next time saints, God willing.

Love Natasha.

You Were Made to Last Forever

One thing every single person on the planet has in common is that they will die one day. Death is the only thing you know for certain will happen in this life and yet, I would say it is the one thing that causes more pain than any other experience.

When we see a terrible car accident happen right in front of our eyes. When we hear a story about a missing child that was never found. When someone dies unexpectedly without the chance to say goodbye. When you watch your loved one slowly deteriorate from a terminal illness, to the point of being almost unrecognizable before they breathe their last breath.

In each of these moments, we are confronted with the reality of death.

And it never gets easier.

In those moments we often grab onto the spiritually things of this world; we hope that heaven is real. We find peace thinking that the reason that person died was because God must have needed another angel. We are comforted by the idea of seeing them again one day.

Perhaps without realising it, when we think this way, we are throwing around religious concepts without thinking about the magnitude of what they actually mean.

This blog might have a slightly different feel to it than some of my others, and what I’m about to say might be a little controversial for you. It might even upset you, but I strongly encourage you to read my words carefully. Even if this is the last blog you ever read of mine, take a moment to really think about what I’m about to say.

Just because something makes your feel better in your grief, doesn’t make it true

Think about it

Do you believe in God?

Do you believe in heaven?

Do you believe in hell?

Do you think you know who deserves to go to heaven and who doesn’t?

Are you completely adamant that someone like Adolf Hitler is in hell? Because he deserves it right?

Do you look at someone like Mother Teresa and think they were a ‘good person’ and deserve to be dancing around on the clouds up in the sky?

Let me ask you this:

What does God think about you?

Do you think God looks at someone like you and says

‘You’re not so bad, at least you didn’t murder someone.”

As long as you didn’t do anything tooooo terrible you deserve heaven right?

But let’s take a step back for a second.

To what standard are you basing this on?

 

Let’s talk about heaven

Heaven is real. It is far beyond what we could ever imagine it to be. The Bible doesn’t describe it in detail but what we can gather from scripture is that it is a place without any pain, or hurt, or sadness. Heaven is a place of complete perfection.

But what we forget most often is the greatest reward of heaven… it is the place where we will get to be with God

Face to face

FOREVER!

If that didn’t excite you, your idea of heaven is not based on ANY truth. Regardless of what religion you follow, the idea of heaven being void of a God is based on an idea that you have made up in your head that has been diluted from RELIGIOUS belief over hundreds and hundred of years.

Heaven makes no sense without God. It has no basis without God and just because it makes you feel better to believe in it, doesn’t make it true.

If there is no God, why would heaven need to exist? Just think about that question for a moment and answer it honestly.

If there is no God we are just vessels of stardust. We are just evolved monkeys. We are just STUFF that at the end of life turns into dirt. We have no eternal significance.

Does that make you uncomfortable?

ME TOO!

If you feel “but that just doesn’t feel right to me, there has to be more.”

Then like millions of other people, you don’t think life is void of a deeper purpose. Deep within your heart you know that here on earth is not all there is.

“Also, he has put eternity into man’s heart, yet so that he cannot find out what God has done from the beginning to the end.” Ecclesiastes 3:11

My friend, you are not crazy to think this way. Like the Bible says, we were MADE with this instilled in our hearts! We were created with a desire for eternity because eternity is REAL!!!!

You are not just stardust!!

But here’s the hard truth.

If there is a heaven, there is a God who created it.

And if there is a God who created it, there is a God who is in charge of it.

So often we are just living our own way and disregarding everything the creator of heaven commands, yet still expecting to die and get the privilege of being with Him in heaven forever.

Over the centuries the biblical truth about heaven has been filtered and diluted to be a heart warming, fuzzy-feeling-producing, fairy tale that we tell our children and ourselves to help us sleep at night when someone passes away. And without even realizing it, we think that WE have the say as to who gets to go to heaven and who doesn’t.

REGARDLESS of what the creator of heaven thinks or says about it.

Does that sound logical to you?

If you believe in there being a place that was created for our souls to go after life here on earth, wouldn’t it make sense to consider what you need to do to get there???

Or do you fancy just winging it until then and hoping for the best?

Do you believe you can live your life not wanting anything to do with God here and now, yet reap all the benefits of what he prepared for those who love and obey him?

If you do you have based your beliefs about heaven on your OWN standards. NOT GOD’S.

Heaven is HIS!

HE created it

HE owns it

And HE decides who gets to go there.

and in case you haven’t already put two and two together yet, I’m here to tell you

You don’t make the cut.

It doesn’t matter who you are reading this, I already know that you don’t make the cut.

“for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” Romans 3:23

And before you think I’m being judgmental….THAT INCLUDES ME TOO!!!!

Hitler isn’t the only one who deserves to go to hell

I do

and you do too.

God’s standard

God is Holy. He is completely perfect! And nothing short of perfect can dwell with him. Every monotheistic religion believes this.

When we sin, we spit in the face of God. We turn our backs on what he commands us to do. We regard our ways better than his.

Oh how we do this more than we even realize!

And this separates us from a perfectly holy and righteous God.

But here is where Christianity is different to every other religion in this world: No matter what you think, you are not inherently good; you are not a good person, and you cannot eliminate the bad you do by just doing some more good.

The MOMENT you sinned, you were disqualified for heaven! No do overs. You’re out!

What is sin you ask? I answered that a little while back so go check it out (https://onebodyonegod.wordpress.com/2018/05/22/that-3-letter-word-you-dont-want-to-hear/)

Sin is in our nature

“None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God. All have turned aside; together they have become worthless; no one does good, not even one” Romans 3:10-12

“Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned” Romans 5:12

No one can get into Heaven based on their own merit.

NO ONE!!

NOT EVEN Mother Teresa (yep you heard me right). Her deeds did not make her good enough to go to heaven.

Because NO MATTER how much good she did, it was not good enough to make her as good as God.

Nothing short of perfect can dwell with the perfect creator.

Compared to God, Mother Teresa and Hitler are the same.

They are sinners.

Right about now you’re probably thinking this blog is a little harsh. Maybe you think I’m a bible basher and this might be the last thing you read from me.

But that’s ok!

Why?

Because now that you have heard the bad news, the good news is going to be so much sweeter!

He made a way

God provided a way for us to be made right with him! He knew that man would never be able to match up to His holiness. He knew that man would never be good enough based on his own merit to get to heaven. And he knew exactly what had to be done to make it possible….

He had to take our place

In his love, God humbled himself and came down to earth in the form of man and lived the life that you and I couldn’t. He lived a sinless life and humbled himself to the point of death so that we would be made righteous and blameless.

Jesus, the image of the invisible God (Colossians 1:15), took upon himself our sin. He paid the price so that we wouldn’t have to.

Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us (Galatians 3:13)

The shepherd laid down his life for the sheep. (John 10:11)

And three days later He rose again!!! (1 Corinthians 15:4).

In that moment, He conquered death (1 Corinthians 15:55)

And blotted out our sins forever. (Isaiah 43:25)

“It is finished” –Jesus (John 19:30)

We have heaven because of Jesus

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.” John 3:16

What WONDERFUL news that is!

There is NOTHING sweeter than the taste of His incredible grace.

No other god that people will tell you of is willing to die for his children. Every other religion tells you that you must do better, be better, and have everything crossed at the end to make sure you get to heaven.

But Jesus says “you can’t do it so I will do it for you. That’s how much I love you”

“Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends” John 15:13

“Come now, let us reason together, says the LORD: though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red like crimson, they shall become like wool” Isaiah 1:18

Hallelujah!

To my dear friends and loved ones who don’t believe; you are not promised another day and you cannot afford to gamble with this truth. If you do not believe in Christ, you are literally playing with fire.

The Son of Man will send his angels, and they will gather out of his kingdom all causes of sin and all law-breakers, and throw them into the fiery furnace. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father. He who has ears, let him hear. Matthew 13:41-43

Heaven is real and so is hell.

My deepest desire and prayer for you is that from this blog you would realise that when it comes to eternity, you are held to God’s standards, not your own.

And because of that, you need a saviour.

And his name is Jesus.

Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” John 14:6

My dear friend, I tell you this because I love you!

You must repent and believe, your eternity depends on it.

May the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. Until next time, God willing.

Love Natasha

P.S. I was once where you are right now; believing in heaven and the possibility of a God but not having a clue what to do about it. I’m here to tell you that I KNOW that it all seems overwhelming. It seems confusing. You have questions. You have doubts. But deep in your soul, you have a desire to know more. You are not alone. Please reach out to me if you want to talk. Don’t just ignore that voice.

That 3 letter word you don’t want to hear

SIN

In an attempt to make people feel loved, accepted  and encouraged (and probably in fear of sounding judgmental), we shy away from this word a lot.

When sharing the gospel, we glaze over sin. We might mention it but we quickly move on to preaching the fairytale version of the story.

We talk about how much God loves us. We talk about how God has a special purpose for our lives. We talk about all the yesses in Christ that we can claim like peace, joy and love. And by no means do I disagree that these are wonderful truths.

But what happened to talking about God’s wrath? “Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience.” Ephesians 5:6

and about his justice? “But because of your hard and impenitent heart you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath when God’s righteous judgment will be revealed.” Romans 2:5

And the truth that he hates evildoers? “The boastful shall not stand before your eyes; you hate all evildoers.” Psalm 5:5

We might not realize that we are doing it but we are leaving out the parts about God’s character that make him as much God, as love does.

I would go as far to say that when we don’t address sin the way the Bible does and we don’t talk about ALL the attributes of God, we actually reduce the immensity of his great love and mercy toward us.

“What if God, desiring to show his wrath and to make known his power, has endured with much patience vessels of wrath prepared for destruction, in order to make known the riches of his glory for vessels of mercy, which he has prepared beforehand for glory— ” Romans 9:22-23

Why am I writing about this?

This past weekend as I was in worship, I began to weep. I had no idea why. But I couldn’t stop. As I searched my mind for what it was that was upsetting me I just stopped and asked God why I felt this way. And moments later I had my answer.

Sin has lost it’s weightiness in our hearts and it’s the reason our lives don’t change!

Everything that glorifies us before it glorifies him.

Everything that we enjoy more than we enjoy him.

Everything that has more value to us than God himself!

Sin has lost it’s weightiness!!!

Does it break our hearts that we find more pleasure in everything else EXCEPT God?

As I have spent the last few days praying about this and asking for wisdom to why I have felt what I can only describe as ‘sorrow for sin’, I was left with this:

When we sugar coat sin, we belittle the cross and diminish the beauty of grace.

Sometimes God whispers gently to us, other times he strongly convicts us.

And other times it’s like being hit by a bus! I don’t know about you but this broke me.

But didn’t Jesus preach love?

Yes, yes he did. But that is not all he preached!

‘Then he opened their minds to understand the Scriptures, and said to them “Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and the third day rise from the dead, and that repentance for the forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem.” Luke 24:45-47

“I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.” Luke 5:32

“Now after John was arrested, Jesus came into Galilee, proclaiming the gospel of God, and saying, “the time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel” Mark 1:14-15

Did you catch that?

HE PREACHED REPENTANCE! 

“Repenting means experiencing a change of mind that now sees God as true and beautiful and worthy of all our praise and all our obedience. ” – John Piper

Regardless of what you’ve heard in church, repentance is not ‘allowing Jesus to love you’. It is not ‘inviting Jesus into your heart’. It is not saying a prayer one time and living the rest of your life the way you want.

TRUE repentance is the realization that he is

MORE beautiful,

MORE worthy,

MORE incredibly glorious

than ANYTHING ELSE IN THIS LIFE!

And spending the REST OF YOUR LIFE, devoted to that truth!

My life passage

“And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience- among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind.” Ephesians 2:1-3

Do you know why this is my life passage?

Because it continuously reminds me of the fundamental truth of who I am WITHOUT Christ and my DESPERATE NEED FOR HIM!

and without this scripture, the proceeding truth does not have the same impact!

“But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ- by grace you have been saved- and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. Ephesians 2:4-9

I was DEAD. Not just a little damaged….

D.E.A.D

AND HE SAVED ME BY HIS GRACE BECAUSE OF HIS GREAT LOVE FOR ME

Now THAT is the gospel message I want to share!

Friends, if we don’t understand our need to repent and we don’t first see ourselves as desperately sick and wicked people, we will never fully turn to Christ, in a truly saving way.

“As it is written “None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God. All have turned aside; together they have become worthless; no one does good, not even one.” Romans 3:10-12

We are not sinners because we sin, we sin because we are sinners- R C Sproul

The gospel will only become our good news when we fully comprehend our need for Christ.

If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. 1 John 1:8-9

Repent and believe!

Love Natasha

Question 2: Do we have free will?

Once upon a time I would have answered the question “If God is sovereign why is there evil in the world?” with the answer

“Because humans have free-will.”

I usually explained it in this way:

Because God is God, he has authority to do as he pleases. In the garden he decided to give humans free-will and this is one way that he showed his love for us; by not forcing us to follow him, but giving us a choice to do so.

A more official name for this idea is Libertarian free will

Libertarian free will means that our choices are free from the determination or constraints of human nature and free from any predetermination by God. All “free will theists” hold that libertarian freedom is essential for moral responsibility.

In other words, evil has nothing to do with God, it is because of us and the bad decisions we make.

‘But doesn’t that mean God isn’t really all powerful?’ I hear you say….

This can be defended pretty simply: In God’s Sovereignty, he chose to use his power to give us the gift of choice, and in the name of love gave up final authority over some things allowing us to be self-determining (autonomous) beings. This means he is no less powerful because IN his power, that’s what he decided to do.

Sound good?

It sounds deep, it sounds kinda fancy, we think it solves the question. And I would still argue that it does….if we are basing our insight into the character of God on our opinions.

But we don’t have the final say.

What ‘sounds right’ doesn’t matter.

If we want to truly understand what God is like, then our only question should be…

IS THAT WHAT THE BIBLE TEACHES?

Let us backtrack for a moment and make sure we are all on the same page from what I have previously written…

1. Our days were planned FOR us BY God (Psalm 139:15-16)

2. All things happen in this world because they were planned BY Him, caused BY him, and are FOR Him. (Romans 11:36)

3. Even the most random things to us are not truly random to God. Every decision is from the LORD. (Proverbs 16:33)

I’m getting the vibe that the Bible doesn’t agree with libertarian free-will.

But perhaps you are thinking that those 3 scriptures aren’t enough to rule out the argument above. So let’s look at some more.

“And this we will do if God permits.” Hebrews 6:3

Earlier in verse 1 and 2 we get a picture of what is said to need God’s permission: “Therefore let us leave the elementary doctrine of Christ and go on to maturity, not laying again a foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God, and of instruction about washings, the laying on of hands, the resurrection of the dead, and eternal judgment. 

And this we will do if God permits. …” 

Paul is saying that we mature in our walk with the Lord, IF God permits it.

He does not say that we are the final say. He says God is!

Perhaps you are thinking that maybe this can’t be applied broadly to all situations because it is talking about a specific thing (spiritual maturation). And that’s a great point! So let’s keeping looking

“Instead you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.””James 4:15

James says we must not even assume that we can do this or that, apart from the will of God.

What is ‘this or that’?

“Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go into such and such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit”— yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes.” James 4:13-14

Anything that you plan to do tomorrow, is provisional! James says IF the Lord wills it you will do it. He is teaching that it ULTIMATELY depends on the will of God! Not you.

“I know, O LORD, that the way of man is not in himself, that it is not in man who walks to direct his steps.” Jeremiah 10:23

If libertarian free-will were true, then we have to contend with the idea of scripture being totally redundant. I want to quote Charles Spurgeon’s commentary on this scripture

“This was Jeremiah’s consolation, ‘I do not know what Nebuchadnezzer may do; but I do know that “the way of man is not in himself: it is not in man that walketh to direct his steps.” I know that, in God’s eternal purposes, every step of Judah’s way is mapped out, and he will make it all work for his own glory and the good of his chosen people in the end.’”

Spurgeon highlights that Jeremiah did not believe that Judah was able to do whatever they wanted to do, he did not teach libertarian free-will, in fact he taught the opposite. God had the final say.

We can conclude from scripture that ANYTHING that happens in our lives will ONLY happen IF the Lord ordained it

The human will

“The Will is, that by which the mind chooses any thing….an act of the will is the same as an act of choosing or choice.” Jonathan Edwards

Edwards never denied that we as humans have the ability to choose what we want to do, we have a will. In his book Freedom of the Will (which I’ve only read part of because it’s a heavy read) he wonderfully highlights the biblical definition of our human will in light of the sovereignty of God. But sadly I often see people perverting the words of writers like Edwards and other reformed theologians to mean something they never intended them to mean. Reformed theology is commonly accused of explaining God’s sovereignty in a way that treats humans like God’s puppets, being made to do what they don’t want to do. I’ve heard people say that Calvinists believe that God drags us kicking and screaming into new life with Christ. This could not be further from the truth and is obviously not biblical at ALL! This is not the understanding of people like Edwards and reformed theology as a whole.

Let me just take a little rabbit trail for a minute for anyone who is possibly thinking “but does all this really matter? Aren’t we just called to love people like Jesus loved and to love God. Theology is just confusing and unnecessary to share the gospel.

Do you believe that what we understand about the character of God matters?

Then you believe theology matters.

Do you want to worship the God of the Bible and not just an idea of what you think God should be like?

Then you believe theology matters.

“but in your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect,” 1 Peter 3:15

So, if I’m going to say that I don’t believe in libertarian free-will, I have to know what I do believe in.

Okay let’s get back to the original topic because I want to make an attempt to simplify (as much as I can) some of the more complex ideas about the human will in light of the scripture we previously have read.

Our choices are real

We make conscious decisions every single day. It is no mystery that we make hundreds of choices daily. Think about the last decision you made today. Big or small, what was it? As you are reading this, perhaps the last choice you made was to read my blog? So let us consider you willing to reading this post and ask a few more questions.

What made you decide to read my blog today? Really think about it for a moment.

What inclined you to click on the link? What went through your mind when you came across my post?

Whether you realized it or not, there is absolutely nothing that you do that has not first been willed, otherwise you wouldn’t do it. Let me explain what I mean by that in light of Edwards’ definition of the will and the example of reading this blog.

You chose to read my blog and so you clicked on the link. You may be thinking that you didn’t click on my blog for any particular reason and you just began reading because you were bored….. BUT that is still a motive! You desired to fill your time with something so you clicked on the link which led you to reading these very words.

When you chose to click on the link to my blog you desired to read this post over not reading it. You experienced a preference and acted upon it.

Are you following?

Ok good, stay with me!

From this we can say that choosing one thing over another is always based on what we prefer at a specific point in time. Let me use a few example motives as to why you are reading this blog to illustrate my point further.

1. Perhaps you are reading this blog because you’re a friend of mine. You saw it on Facebook and you just want to be supportive by reading it. Your desire to be seen as a good friend drove you to reading this blog.

2. Maybe you have read one of my blogs before and got some enjoyment out of it. Your desire to perhaps learn something (or procrastinate at work) was a preference that you acted on and clicked the link to start reading.

3. Or maybe you felt obligated to read this (hi mum and dad!) and your desire to maintain a positive relationship with me trumped the grief you would have to go through if you didn’t read it.

4. Although a rare possibility because I average about 15 views per post, maybe you don’t actually know me and you came across my blog from a google search. You found the title interesting and your curiosity of the subject drove you to read my blog. If that’s you, hello stranger! 🙂

Regardless of what your motive was, do you get my point? You didn’t just get to this blog from a completely neutral perspective, otherwise you would have just sat staring at your computer without doing anything. An INTERNAL preference made you decide to open this page and begin reading.

As I’m a deep thinker maybe some of you are heading down a rabbit trail like I did when first approaching this idea. Are you thinking that you do things all the time that you don’t really want to do? Who really wants to getting up for work on a Monday morning am I right?

But that really is not the same thing as being forced to do something against your will.  Although you might not want to get up for work tomorrow at 5am, you may experience a preference to stay in bed, nothing external forces you to get up, get dressed and head to work. Nothing coerced you to do those things against your will as if you were a puppet on a string. The reality is that your desire to keep your job and go home with a paycheck outweighed that extra sleep and so you CHOSE to get up and go to work.

You experienced a stronger preference to stay employed than to sleep longer.

Do you get what I’m saying?

Humans make REAL choices every single day! I do not disagree on that point. And there are things we do all the time that might not be what we would describe as ‘wants’ per say, BUT, our strongest internal desire will always determine the external decisions we make.

That was a long winded way of explaining it I’m sure, but I really want to make sure you understand that I absolutely believe we make decisions! I have no problem admitting that we make choices which God holds us responsible for.

But to ever describe the human will in a way that suggests those decisions ever happen outside the final say of God is what I am opposed to.

And that includes evil!

Murder, lying, cheating, stealing and rape all happen because people make choices to do those things. But that does not mean it was because God gave up authority and gave them ‘free-will’ in a way that made them self-determining. The Bible teaches repetitively that nothing happens unless God ordained that that thing would happen.

We make decisions but we are not autonomous.

According to the Bible Libertarian free-will does not exist.

“If God is sovereign why is there evil in the world?”

Because that is what God decided would happen.

But why?

That I will have to get to next time, God willing

Love Natasha

“And they showed him sympathy and comforted him for all the evil that the LORD had brought upon him.” Job 42:2

BUT WHY? Question 1 continued…

My last blog began to address one of the very common questions I hear among believers and non-believers alike:

“Has God predetermined every single detail of what will happen in the world?” and I concluded with the statement:

God acts and no-one can change that. Our plans are not his. What we think ‘should’ happen is not what happens. Even the most random things to us are not truly random. God decides, God determines, God establishes.

But I think that some of you may still have some more questions about this topic (I know I did when I began to consider the scope of God’s supreme power). In the last blog I didn’t go into any specifics and it was more of an overview of what ‘sovereign’ really means. If I could take a guess you are probably still thinking…

But just how sovereign are you talking? 

How Sovereign is Sovereign?

“My frame was not hidden from you, when I was being made in secret, intricately woven in the depths of the earth. Your eyes saw my unformed substance; in your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there was none of them” Psalm 139:15-16

This passage tells us that our existence did not just happen by accident. Regardless of how much family planning your parents did to conceive you, God was the one who skillfully put together your frame. The intricacy of your DNA that makes you YOU, was planned before you were even a THOUGHT in your parents’ minds.

From this scripture we are taught a fundamental truth:

That every single one of our days has already been determined by God. They were formed and written down before any of them came to be!

Not BY us

But FOR us

BY GOD

I feel like I could stop this blog right there and answer the previous question “how sovereign is sovereign” very simply

TOTALLY

The very truth that every single day you have ever experience was ordained by God should be enough to exude praise and ignite us to glorify his name, gladly proclaiming his absolutely control over our lives.

I lie down and sleep; I wake again, because the Lord sustains me. Psalm 3:5

But sadly this is not the case for many who claim to believe in God.

But why?

From my last blog I highlighted that all monotheists believe in a sovereign God. Muslims will tell you that they believe God is in control of all things. Every Christian will tell you that God is all powerful and has supreme authority.

But this does NOT infer the same belief about God’s sovereignty among everyone.

Within Christianity alone, the question ‘how sovereign is sovereign?’ has been split into different theological ‘camps’ and has been debated for centuries! There are HUGE degrees of variation in what the answer to this question truly is.

Rather than explaining all the differences in beliefs between the differing theologies or labeling myself as a supporter of one of them, I just want to look at what the Bible tells us.

 Sola Scriptura-  Scripture alone is authoritative for the faith and practice of the Christian. The Bible is complete, authoritative, and true.

“For who has known the mind of the LORD, or who has been his counselor? Or who has given a gift to him that he might be repaid? For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen” Romans 11:34-36

The author of this passage was the Apostle Paul, a man who would have been familiar with all the scriptures of the Old Testament (and when I say familiar I mean that he would have studied them intensely over the course of his ministry). It is also understood that he wrote 13 of the 66 books that make up our bible today! So it’s safe to say he would not have been a stranger to biblical truth.

In this text he says that to think of God in a purely responsive role is folly. There is nothing that we give God that He does not already have or need. We cannot repay a perfect and Holy God.

Although there are plenty of scriptures that teach that God does respond to our actions, this does not mean that we are autonomous creatures. I see too often the biblical reality of human responsibility for our decisions to be the reason the sovereignty of God is diminished in people’s minds. Our finite brains can not fathom how God is absolutely sovereign over every decision yet we are absolutely responsible for the decisions we make, and this causes one of two things to happen:

1. We think God is totally sovereign and therefore our decisions don’t matter

2. We think people are more powerful than they are and God’s plan doesn’t matter

You may think God’s sovereignty and human responsibility are contradictions at first glance, but as I have said in previous blogs, if we hold the bible to be the word of God, there cannot be real contradictions. If God contradicted himself we could not depend on anything He says! Mystery is not the same as contradiction!

So when we see something that seems like a contradiction we need to stop and make sure that we understand what is truly being taught.

What we do matters

Let’s first look at some of the scriptures that teach that our actions cause God to respond

“The Lord is near to all who call on him, to all who call on him in truth” Psalm 145:18.

This is teaching that when we call on God in truth He is near, meaning He responds. But some of you might be thinking that this isn’t clear enough for us because there is a condition attached to it. You might be thinking “but what does “in truth” mean?”. So let us look at some other texts

“And whatever you ask in prayer, you will receive, if you have faith” Matthew 21:22.

This blatantly teaches that faith in God and praying to Him evokes a response from Him. But you must have faith, there is a condition! So let’s keep searching.

“Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened.” Matthew 7:7-8.

Okay so now we have something that is a little bit more black and white. Our actions of asking, seeking and knocking result in God responding to us. Those who do these things, God will answer.

But we make a HUGE error when we stop there because the scriptures teach beyond this.

The bible definitely teaches that our actions matter; we are told to obey (John 14:15), pray (Philippians 4:6), trust (Psalm 37:5), seek (Matthew 6:33), and ask (James 1:5). All of these action words highlight our active role in our relationship with the Lord. This is what I mean when I say that the Bible teaches that we have human responsibility.

Early on in my Christian walk I was content with taking this to mean that I was ultimately self-determining. I believed, as you can tell from some of my earlier blogs, that my decisions were mine alone and it was God who responded to what I chose to do. When I prayed it was because I chose to and nothing else caused that other than my self-governing decision. When I sought out God by opening up my bible and going to church every week, I did those things because I wanted to and I made the choice to do so. So of course when I was having a tough time I believed I had drifted from God and it was because I was just not pressing into Him hard enough. I needed to make the decision to do more and turn back. Because God loved me He gave me ‘free-will’ to chose Him and I was just using that privilege for my wants. If I stopped and I tried harder to pursue God, God would respond to that.

And I don’t totally disagree with that idea now. BUT what I found when I began to study scripture was a different picture being painted. Let’s go back to the passage in Romans 11:

“For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen” (v.36)

Paul is telling us that God does not rely on anyone and is not just waiting for us to act so he can play his responding role. Verse 36 teaches a much deeper truth than this:

From Him, meaning out of, by

Through Him, implying the channel of an act, the cause

To Him: into, unto, for, towards.

All things: Each, individually, all, the whole, everything, collectively.

Every single thing that happens in this world is planned BY Him, is caused BY him, and is FOR Him.

This idea was not foreign to other people in the bible! Job, who arguably went through more suffering than anyone I’ve ever known, puts it this way:

“Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked shall I return. The LORD gave and the LORD has taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord.” Job 1:21

Job recognized that he started out in this world with nothing, he entered the world bare. He acknowledged that anything he had been granted was by God and likewise, anything taken away must also be by God.

Interestingly, although Job didn’t know it, Satan was actually the one who was attacking him. Satan caused all his family to be killed and all that he had to be destroyed.

AH HA! I hear you say, “bad things are caused by Satan, not God.” and yes I agree with you, they are…. if you look at the surface level.

What God wants matters

The deeper truth that the Bible teaches is that Satan did not and COULD NOT do anything that had not first been permitted by God.

Some people will say “God allowed these things” to happen to Job to try to get around the idea of God ordaining evil to take place. But earlier in verse 8 a very different story is told:

‘And the LORD said to Satan “Have you considered my servant Job, that there is none like him on the earth, a blameless and upright man, who fears God and turns away from evil?”’

God being omniscient knew exactly what Satan would do. He did not just passively allow for something to happen to Job and then hope to turn it into something good later on.

He OFFERED Job up to Satan…God said “There you go Satan, take this man who is a good man in my eyes and do whatever you like to him just don’t kill him” (my paraphrase).

Although God had total authority to STOP anything bad from happening, He chose that Job would experience all that he did. Satan was responsible for the bad, He was the one doing it, but God was the one who decided that it would happen.

But why? Another great question I hope to answer in future blogs!

If you are thinking that the example of Job is just a one-off and you can’t apply it to us, turn to the Book of Ephesians where Paul doesn’t sugarcoat God’s sovereign will!

‘Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love he predestined us for adoption as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will,’ Ephesians 1:3-5

God did not wait to respond to a choice that I made on my own. He had already predetermined that it would happen! According to the purpose of HIS WILL!

“In him we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will.” Ephesians 1:11

Not some things

ALL things!

In that verse there is ZERO mention of us being the ones who cause anything to happen. It teaches that everything we inherit has been decided beforehand based on GOD’S PURPOSE and we are promised that He does this so that everything happens according to what HE wants to come to pass.

Holding tension in our minds

How do these two separate truths tie together?

That, I do not have the answer to.

As John Piper has said, putting the label “free will” on it does not explain anything. God being absolutely sovereign over all things and us being totally responsible for the decisions we make, is a mystery that we must be willing to accept and live by if we wish to live by the complete word of God. Accepting both truths is the only way to remain consistently biblical in what we believe and what we teach.

The bible teaches very clearly that

1. Nothing happens unless it has been decreed in advance by God

“Who can speak and have it happen if the Lord has not decreed it? Is it not from the mouth of the Most High that both calamities and good things come?” Lamentations 3:37-38

2. Yet He holds us accountable for every decision we make

“For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each of us may receive what is due us for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad.” 2 Corinthians 5:10

Until next time, God willing 😉

Love Natasha

“So then it depends not on human will or exertion, but on God, who has mercy” Romans 9:16

 

NEW SERIES: BUT WHY? Question 1

Has God predetermined every single detail of what will happen in the world?

In other words, have our lives already been planned out by God?

When I first started to think about the idea of there being a divine power (I wasn’t a believer at this point), one of the first things I wanted to understand was the extent to which this ‘power’ had control of the whole world.

I had reached a point in my life where I had conceded that the world didn’t just start spontaneously by itself; in my mind it was totally unreasonable to say that nothing, No single thing, not anything, NO thing, created something.

For those of you reading this that think it takes more faith to believe that God created the universe, let me suggest something to you: doesn’t it take an extreme amount of faith to believe that nothing created something?

It doesn’t just take faith, it takes total disregard of human logic!

If you argue like I once did that the world started by a big bang then you agree that the world hasn’t always existed. Science has proven that there is in fact a start point to the universe. So if we agree that the universe has a beginning then we have to also agree that at one point there was no universe. It was nothing.

So the question remains, how can nothing create itself? You have to have faith in the idea of a completely spontaneous explosion that had no external influences. You have to believe that nothing created something.

For me, this just did not make any sense.

I think I could write a whole other blog series about how science shows over and over that our universe is so intricately designed in a way that proves that it all didn’t just happen by chance.

But I want to make something perfectly clear first, especially if you haven’t read my other blogs:

How I came to faith in Jesus Christ was not by having all the dots matched up. I didn’t have all the answers (and still don’t). I didn’t just decide one day that it would be a good idea to believe. I didn’t join a church because I needed friends. I didn’t keep going to church because it made me feel good about myself.

All I know is that the day I walked into church I left changed. My heart KNEW that day that Jesus Christ died for my sins. Not because I had all the answers but because my heart had been changed! and it changed everything for me!

Although this blog is not about my personal testimony, I think it’s important that you know that I’m not trying to convince anyone who is not a believer to become one from this blog. I have NO doubt that we come to faith by grace alone and it is 100% a work of GOD! It cannot be purely from knowing things. But I do feel there are a lot of people like me who have so many questions like I once did that are hindering them from seeing the truth. And I feel that God has called me to use my life and my experience to perhaps reach even just one person reading this who is searching for answers to their questions.

This blog will not be the cause of anyone’s salvation but it could very well be the means that God uses to reach one of his lost children.

Let’s get back to the big question….

So if you are still following, we are at a point that we understand that the only logical explanation for the creation of the universe is by something. Let me dig into that a little further.

When we speak of ‘God’ we often throw terms around such as omnipresent (all present), omniscient (all knowing), and omnipotent (all powerful). We say that God has:

1. Supreme power: He has AUTHORITY
2. Freedom from outside control: He is AUTONOMOUS
3. Ruling over all reality: He is SOVEREIGN

This is not unique to Christianity, it is what all monotheists believe: That there is a God who has complete control and authority over the whole world and does not rely on anything else except Himself to govern whatsoever comes to pass.

R C Sproul put it like this, “God being sovereign over the whole world is not a view that is unique to reformed theory, it is the view of all theists.”

In Chapter III of The Westminster Confession of Faith it is stated like this

“God from all eternity, did, by the most wise and holy counsel of His own will, freely, and unchangeably ordain whatsoever comes to pass;”

A few side notes for you deep thinkers out there:

• Some of you may be thinking about polytheism- the idea of there being multiple God’s but based on the definition of God being ALL powerful, ALL knowing, and ALL present, being AUTONOMOUS, having complete AUTHORITY and being totally SOVEREIGN, by default eliminates the potential for there to be more than one of Him. If there are gods with limits as to what they control we have blown the previous definition of what it means to be God. So let us move on.
• this may have raised the question in your mind of the Trinity in Christianity. I’m not going to go into this doctrine as there are plenty of others who have defined it well. https://www.desiringgod.org/articles/what-is-the-doctrine-of-the-trinity being one of my recommendations to read. But let me just assure you now that a core doctrinal belief of the Christian faith is that there is one God, the One true God who governs the universe. Christians do not believe in three gods.
• I’m not going to explain why I believe in Christianity and not other religions in this blog. This is a HUGE topic and not something I would do any justice to if you are looking for ‘evidence’ like I once was as a none believer. I would recommend reading Case for Christ by Lee Strobel (there is also a movie) and Seeking Allah, Finding Jesus by Nabeel Qureshi. For me I believe in the Lord Jesus Christ because of what I have experienced over the last 4 years. Reading the books I’ve mentioned definitely excited me but all they did was back up what I already knew in my heart. So with that being said, from this point forth when I am talking about God I am referencing the God of the bible.

The Sovereignty of God

Proverbs 16

“The plans of the heart belong to man, but the answer of the tongue is from the LORD” (v.1). That which we internally plan (in our hearts) is not the final answer, God is.

“The heart of man plans his way, but the LORD establishes his steps” (v.9). We have desires that we want to follow but the causation of every step is from the Lord

“The lot is cast into the lap, but it’s every decision is from the LORD” (v.33). Casting of lots is like rolling of dice. We think the result is random but God says it’s every result comes from Him.

Can we just ponder those three verses and the magnitude of what they are teaching….And this chapter is not alone in it’s teaching

“Many are the plans in the mind of a man, but it is the purpose of the LORD that will stand” Proverbs 19:21

“I know, O LORD, that the way of man is not in himself, that it is not in man who walks to direct his steps” Jeremiah 10:23

“I form light and create darkness, I make well being and create calamity, I am the LORD, who does all these things” Isaiah 45:7

“Also henceforth I am he; there is none who can deliver from my hand; I work and who can turn it back?” Isaiah 42:13

God acts and no-one can change that. Our plans are not his. What we think ‘should’ happen is not what happens. Even the most random things to us are not truly random.

God decides

God determines

God establishes

Let us hold onto this biblical truth:

He is REALLY big. REALLY powerful. REALLY SOVEREIGN

And I’m sure now you have a 100 more questions! We’ll get to them next time.

Love Natasha

“I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.” Ezekiel 36:27

 

But why?

Hey everyone! It’s me again! I know it’s been awhile since I last posted a blog. But I’m back and excited to be writing again!

Where have I been?

When I started my blog last year, although I had the best intentions when I claimed that I would be posting weekly, it really wasn’t realistic for me. I knew I had clearly heard from God that He wanted me to start writing and encouraging other women in their walks with Christ and although I knew God had given me the desire to use my passion in health and fitness to inspire others, I didn’t wait to hear exactly HOW He wanted me to do that! I quickly took to the first idea that popped into my head and thought ‘I’ll write a weekly blog’. So I came up with a funky/catchy name, I created a Facebook and an Instagram and started putting myself out there. I went full speed ahead.

But I was relying heavily on what I thought needed to be done instead of what GOD wanted me to do.

And of course it didn’t last long.

Not only did I not physically have the time with all my schoolwork and other commitments to be writing something worthy of posting weekly, in all honesty, I didn’t even have anything to say after my last blog. I think I had forgotten that I’ve only been walking with the Lord since 2014 and although He has grown and matured me greatly in my walk since then, there was (and still is) a lot of learning to be done. I have no shame in saying I genuinely didn’t have enough knowledge to be giving out advice weekly.

When I look back over my other blogs, I can see that when I started writing my heart truly believed in the Lord and already firmly knew that He was the only answer for real life change in this world.

My faith was firmly in Christ and what He did for me on the cross.

I was definitely saved, desiring to live for God and encourage others to do so!

But I still had a lot of grey areas in my theology.

Theology matters!

Some of you are probably thinking ‘nobody knows it all and as long as you love Jesus it doesn’t really matter’…. I agree and I don’t agree, here’s why:

I personally have a problem when there are things that I have previously written that do not totally align with scripture. R. C. Sproul said in his book ‘Chosen by God’ that it is better to be inconsistently biblical than consistently unbiblical, but he also stressed throughout the book that we should be aiming to be consistently biblical in what we believe about the character of God, even when that means embracing mystery!

I feel very strongly that if I am going to talk about God and use scripture to apply to something I’m trying to say then I need to know a lot more than what I’ve heard at church on Sunday.

1. I need to understand the context of specific scriptures and whether I can apply them to what I am saying. Although “all scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness” (2 Timothy 3:16) not all scripture applies to every situation! Context is key!
2. I need to have a grasp on the character of God. “I the LORD do not change; therefore you, O children of Jacob, are not consumed.” (Malachi 3:6). If He does not change then I need to know who He says He is throughout the whole bible! What is said in the New Testament MUST be interpretated alongside the Old Testament. BOTH are important for us today!

I had just begun believing what my pastors had told me and would regurgitate the answers they had given me if anyone ever asked me a question about what I believed. I could throw around the Christian verbiage, I knew some of the Jesus lingo but I had not truly taken the time to study God’s word for myself. There was no context and no real grasp of the true, biblical character of God.

Although I knew what it felt like to experience God working in my life, I had no way of discerning between right and wrong.

How could I when I wasn’t studying the word consistently? Reading a verse here and there in a daily devotional just didn’t cut it!

How could I learn when all I was praying about were the things I wanted in my life? I was not approaching God with the desire for Him to open the eyes of my heart to who He is and what HE wants!!

I was merely scratching the surface.

Without even realising I had begun to submit to human logic instead of what the bible teaches. And I know I’m not the only one who does it! How many of us come to the bible with the mindset of

“Well it must mean this”?

“Surely it cannot mean that”?

We begin to rely on what ‘sounds right’ in our minds instead of what the bible is actually saying.

Now I’m not saying that we have to embrace contradictions ; the bible can’t say that Jesus is God in one verse and then say that Jesus is not God in another verse. God does not contradict himself! So when we come across something that seems contradictory to us, we have to submit to the reality that it is our limited understanding that is the issue! If it doesn’t fit our human logic we cannot just force it to mean something that it is not actually saying. There are mysteries that are to be embraced

‘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’ Isaiah 55:8-9

The turning point

Last year God changed my approach to His word through a very dear friend of mine in my ladies group when I asked her a pretty deep question, I won’t go into what that question was today but God willing, I will be posting about that topic in future blogs.

Right then He halted my ability to write anything worth posting because He had more that He wanted to show me. I needed to take a step back and start to learn for myself. The questions that I kept trying to silence after I had been told that I was thinking ‘too deeply’ in my past and was made to feel like my analytical brain was eventually going to turn me into an Atheist, were not wrong! And God was going to use them to take me so much deeper.

After months and months of late night bible study sessions, hours of debating and discussing with other believers, reading ALOT of books, listening to an array of sermons from a mixture of pastors, and honestly a lot of tears (happy and heartbreaking), I can say that it has been an incredible journey! And it continues

Which leads me to tell you why I’m writing today.

Today I’m not going to claim that I’m going to begin to write a blog weekly and I’m definitely not saying that I now have all the answers to all my questions because that would be a big fat lie.

The reality is that there are things that we will never know.

“The secret things belong to the LORD our God, but the things that are revealed belong to us and to our children forever, that we may do all the words of this law” Deuteronomy 29:29

I will be learning God’s word for the rest of my life.

And there will mysteries that I will never know until I meet God in heaven.

But what I believe God wants me to do is start writing again and take you along the journey that He has had me on over the last year because I know that everything that has happened is not just for my mind and my life. I am going to attempt to do this over the course of however long God allows me to, and dig into some of the deeper things that we too often palm off as only important for the John Piper’s of this world.

This is the start to a blog series titled

BUT WHY?

My prayer through this whole series is that if you are reading this and profess to be a Christian, that you will be inspired to dig into His word for yourself and think beyond that which you currently do. Not to settle in just what others teach you or what you think the Bible should mean based on your human logic but find out what God’s word actually says. Not just to attain knowledge but to fall completely in love with His incredible majesty.

If you do not have a relationship with God, I pray that this blog series stimulates your mind to consider some of those questions you may have that you feel are hindering you to believe. I’ve been there too and I’m pretty sure any question you have, I’ve had the exact same thought before.

I’m here to tell you that you do not have to turn your brain off to be a Christian. God made us to think, to dig deep, and to ask questions. The bible itself evokes questions and God knows this, He INTENDED this! Augustine once said that scripture is “shallow enough for a child not to drown, yet deep enough for an elephant to swim.”

 

When we dig into His truth from a heart that desires to know Him for who He says He is and understand Him in a way that means we can live more fully for Him, I have no doubt that he will reveal His character to us in a way that we have never experienced before.

Stay tuned!