Day 2781 of the 7 day Bible verse challenge. 2 John 1:9. Anyone who runs ahead and does not continue in the teaching of Christ does not have God; whoever continues in the teaching has both the Father and the Son. NIV
You know, it’s all well and good that we think so highly of ourselves. It’s fine for us to assume that we have this freedom that gives us both the right to do as we please as well as an immunity to consequence should doing as we please prove unwise and harmful. It’s wonderful to think that there is no danger or harm in choices made in order to follow our hearts toward all our worldly desires. It’s great to run ahead and live as if there is no limit nor hindrance nor personal responsibility to humble ourselves in adherence to a truth other than our own.
But just because we think we can do all of the above does not mean that God agrees.
As we discussed yesterday, each of us have grown highly accustomed to this way of life in which we believe we actually have the right to do anything. We have found comfort in this idea that tells us that we can approach every single day without restraint. We love thinking that we’re truly free to do as we please without fear of any kind of repercussion from doing so. All of which are built upon one of our favorite lies in that nothing we do is wrong.
The thing is that we don’t get to decide that. God didn’t call us to the table when He set creation in motion. He didn’t ask for our input when He authored righteousness. He didn’t ask for some ideas when He defined wisdom. And He still doesn’t need our help deciding what’s right and what’s wrong. He has firmly established those within the truth He set forth in Scripture.
Who are we to think that we can honestly contend with the One who created us? Isaiah 45:9 — Does the clay say to the potter, “What are you making?” Romans 9:2 — “Shall what is formed say to the one who formed it, ‘Why did you make me like this?’” Our human arrogance fostered by a world fueled by arrogance has convinced us that we can look God in the eye and make Him squirm. We’ve bought this foolish idea that has us thinking God will bend.
He won’t.
He can’t. You see, if God fails to be anything other than the righteous, jealous, powerful, authoritative, and just God that He is, then He simply wouldn’t be God. He is immoveable. He is the first word and the last. He has the power to both create and destroy. He tells us what’s true because He is truth. As I said yesterday, our only part in all of this is deciding how we receive His truth, not contending with Him in hopes of making Him entertain our own.
The fact of the matter is that life in this place with carry on as it has for thousands of years. People all around will run ahead chasing that lie that tells them they have the right to do anything. Millions have and millions more will deny Christ, debate God’s Word, ignore the offering of salvation, and enjoy their time on this earth lavishing in the free will that they’ve been given. Each of us do have that right because God has given us that latitude to live as we please.
But if we think that He’s honestly okay with us choosing sin over righteousness, then we know nothing of the Gospel. You see, the Gospel of Christ points to our fallen nature. Christ came to this earth to help us see just how warped and corrupted we’d become so that we could understand the dire need to repent and turn from our broken ways and seek out the healing that He came to bring. Christ endured the cross in order to leave us no ability to say we didn’t know the danger or the cost of our sins.
Yet still, humanity has largely managed to run ahead without humbling themselves to the message of the Gospel. The temptations of sin and the appeal of our deceitful desires are simply too alluring to leave behind. That lie that still whispers that we can do anything we want without having to obey all these rules or admit our guilt or acknowledge our mistakes is still really powerful. And so we’re left with the choice of what we’re going to listen to.
Do we continue ahead living according to the lies that we’ve always believed in the assumption that either God isn’t there or that He doesn’t care what we do or that He’s just really nice and will forgive us anyway? Or do we take Him seriously and alter our lives to live in accordance with the teaching of Christ that tells us that we are in fact wretched sinners who have only an eternity of suffering waiting for us due to our wayward choices that can only be avoided through heartfelt repentance and being reborn into a new life spent chasing righteous pursuits rather than sinful indulgence?
That’s both the beauty and the terror of the Gospel. On one hand, it points to our sinful nature and the horrifying consequences that we well deserve for all these years spent ignoring God. It tells of the suffering that awaits those who deny salvation and rebuke God’s truth and ignore His offering of mercy. But on the other hand, it offers us an olive branch. It brings us the chance at healing. It tells us that God, in His infinite love for us, is willing to forgive all of our sins and grant us an open door to an entirely more peaceful eternity.
Again, we are the only ones who can choose which direction we go.
Friends, this faith of ours teaches us that there are only two possible destinations upon the completion of our stay on this earth. Our souls, which are currently held within the earthen vessels we’ve been given from our Father, will return to God to receive the rendering of His righteous judgement. And on that day, we will have nothing to say. There’s nothing we can offer to make up for our mistakes. There’s no excuse good enough to defend our choice to live in sin.
We’ll have nothing, except Christ.
That’s what we’ve been offered in the Gospel. We’ve been given a forgiveness that washes away our transgressions so that they’re no longer between us and God. Christ is our mediator, our life, our hope, our promise, our only chance. Christ bore that cross to open the door that our sinful choices had slammed closed long ago. But we have to accept that gift. We have to understand that we have no hope without that gift.
We have to understand that without accepting His teaching, living our life from here on out according to that teaching, we will never be right in God’s eyes. And if we are never made right in God’s eyes, we will never be found in God’s presence. Without Christ, we’ll never see Heaven, only the hell that we fully deserve. And that, my friends, is simply the truth we have in God’s Word. We don’t have to like it. We don’t have to accept it. But we literally have no hope if we don’t.
“No one comes to the Father except through me.” He has and will always have the final say. We’d be wise to understand and accept that while there’s still time to be made right in God’s eyes through the repentance offered by Christ. Because His blood is our only chance to be granted a forgiveness we do not deserve yet cannot live without.
Warning. Promise. Make of it what you will. But the fact is that God’s not going to budge. And considering He alone determines how our eternity will go, we’d be wise to bend the knee now than to be forced upon it later.
