The End of the Book…
I was doing yardwork again, and Gordon Lightfoot was playing from iHeart Radio on my cell. It was one of his better known songs, “If You Could Read My Mind.”
I love it, and I can do all the lyrics almost from memory. It was written at a dark part of his life as he was sitting alone in an empty house contemplating a separation and divorce. (More details can be found in an article by The Toronto Star.)
Gordon Lightfoot actually has a site for the official lyrics. However, on this afternoon, it was one line that stood out to me:
And you won’t read that book again | Because the ending’s just too hard to take!
I wonder how many Christians have a problem with their Book. How many times do they refuse to pick up their Book and read it again because they can’t tolerate the Revelation ending?
Heaven’s not the problem. Heaven’s never the problem. We like light and joy and grace forever and ever amen.
Hell is the problem. Second death is the problem. The lake of fire is the problem. Final Judgment is the problem. Revelation 20 paints a picture of that place and time.
We can’t understand how a God of mercy and grace who is long-suffering could create a place of eternal suffering for those who reject Him.
As a mama, I can see it as a necessary evil and place of evil.
I watch my kids day in and day out slog through a world that just isn’t wired for them… or maybe they’re not wired for the world. It doesn’t matter which.
Though sinners like all of us (Romans 3:22–24), they are usually sweet-spirited, kind-hearted, and hard-working. They love children and small animals and old people. They shower others with love, respect, and joy most of the time.
So when I watch their peers (and sometimes adults) rejecting them either by silently ignoring them or worse teasing the girls to their faces in a way that the girls can’t figure out they’re being teased, something happens.
My heart hardens and beats faster. I feel the blood course through my veins and throb in my ears and temples. My body tenses and my fists clench. I walk away before I discharge all that anger publicly in a massive show of mama bear rage (forbidden for Christians in Galatians 5:20, just like anger, wrath, strife, fits of rage in versions other than NIV).
How angry must Father God be then?
He sent His Son Jesus into this world. Jesus loved everyone and healed the sick. He chased away demons and servants of darkness. He challenged hypocrisy. He did good and avoided evil and sin all His days. Then, in a stunning show of ultimate love, after laying down all deity powers (Philippians 2:5–8), Jesus laid down His physical human life, hoping to offer mankind one last chance at redemption through the opportunity to not reject Him.
God’s Word is full of all the ways (sin) you can reject Jesus, and I’ve written other posts on it. That’s not what this is about.
Father God is long-suffering, merciful, and patient. He does give ample opportunities for every sinner to repent and come to redemption. He doesn’t want anyone to be separated from Him eternally in the lake of fire.
But at some point, enough will be enough. He will react in support of His Son Jesus against all who have rejected Christ’s death on the Cross.
If you’re a Christian, and you’ve not read the end of the Book, it might be a good idea.
If you’re not a Christian, I encourage to read our Book; it is confusing and contradicting, and yet it was written by a God who loves you and desires eternal friendship with you.
2 Corinthians 5:17–21 (Amplified Bible):
Therefore if anyone is in Christ [that is, grafted in, joined to Him by faith in Him as Savior], he is a new creature [reborn and renewed by the Holy Spirit]; the old things [the previous moral and spiritual condition] have passed away. Behold, new things have come [because spiritual awakening brings a new life]. But all these things are from God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ [making us acceptable to Him] and gave us the ministry of reconciliation [so that by our example we might bring others to Him], that is, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not counting people’s sins against them [but canceling them]. And He has committed to us the message of reconciliation [that is, restoration to favor with God].
So we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were making His appeal through us; we [as Christ’s representatives] plead with you on behalf of Christ to be reconciled to God. He made Christ who knew no sin to [judicially] be sin on our behalf, so that in Him we would become the righteousness of God [that is, we would be made acceptable to Him and placed in a right relationship with Him by His gracious lovingkindness].
John 3:17–18 (The Passion Translation)
“God did not send his Son into the world to judge and condemn the world, but to be its Savior and rescue it! So now there is no longer any condemnation for those who believe in him, but the unbeliever already lives under condemnation because they do not believe in the name of God’s beloved Son.”
