God made all things – human sin has had a spoiling affect – Jesus Christ entered our world to save sinful people and God is proven gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. This sentence pretty much covers the content of the last five weeks of articles.
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What is missing is the human response to God’s creative and redeeming love.
There is never a time, while we are alive, when responding to God’s love revealed in Jesus Christ is too late. So if you are above ground and can still read, then it matters little what age you are. What matters is your response to God’s invitation to be in the right relationship with Him.
Christians believe that the only response to God is the one Jesus Christ called for when he said, “The Kingdom of God is near, repent and believe the good news.”
Put simply, the response is to turn away from sin, ending rebellion against God and putting faith/trust in Him. Such faith comes with an ever-deepening appreciation of God’s kindness and love and brings forth in the Christian a love that seeks to be faithful to God. It was Jesus Christ who said “If you love me, keep my commandments”.
Keeping any commands is a tough call for most of us but when you know that God’s commands express love in action then it makes sense to keep them.
If the love of God is important to them then their repentance will become more notorious than their sin.
So in this sixth week of articles summarising the Christian faith, a world view is developed that offers us a grid of understanding and capacity to assess the world around us.
By way of example, in the last few months I have been deeply concerned for a man and a woman whose love and affections for God have obviously been confused by the emotions and affections they found in each other. I have watched them lose face and position. I have seen the ghoulish side of the media like vultures on a carcass show no mercy, extend no grace, and express in print their loveless self-righteousness.
People in the marketplace have all sorts of opinions and are not backward in expressing them and I admit to counting myself among them. But any opinion should begin with a reflection on one’s own heart. So my reaction to the man and woman’s situation has been, “But by the grace of God, there go I”.
None of us are immune to the temptations of this world, none of us are without sin and its little surprise that hubris tops the list of the seven most deadly sins. As it is in the media, so it is in the church. Self-righteous pride is ugly.
So how should one respond to such a man and woman? From a Christian world view, I would argue, with loving grief and concern. Being loving does not mean acceptance of all behaviours and love demands that wrongs be exposed. But the question is how and with what intent? Wherever unfaithfulness occurs grief is the consequence.
Humanly speaking, unfaithfulness crushes others and is an appalling selfishness. We must, however, not leave God out of this picture because unfaithfulness also grieves Him. As such, if God is our creator and the judge of the living and the dead, then the Christian’s greatest concern for this man and woman is that they come to repentance and faith. That they turn back to God and put their trust in Him.
If the love of God is important to them then their repentance will become more notorious than their sin. Faith in God does that. It helps people up from great falls, wipes the sins of the past away with forgiveness and inspires the repentant to even greater works – not for themselves but for God and others.
Is there hope for the man and the woman caught in sin? You bet your life there is. That’s the good news of Christianity for all of us but it starts with the response of repentance and faith.