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July 11, 2008
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=========================== TODAY'S ARTICLE ==========================
God Gets Mad, by Rubel Shelly
The fear of the Lord is hatred of evil. Pride and arrogance and the
way of evil and perverted speech I hate (Proverbs 8:13 NRS).
When God sees someone abusing his wife, betraying her husband,
corrupting a child, or otherwise perpetrating injustice, it makes him
mad. Anger is the healthy response of a holy and moral God to the
unholy and immoral deeds we perpetrate against one another.
Some theories of social justice and the spiritual life are modeled more
on Aristotle's god -- the "Unmoved Mover" -- than the God we know in
Jesus. When thousands are starving because of ethnic cleansing in
Darfur, homeless because of recent flooding, or being aborted and
abused, anyone who can be "unmoved" is worshiping Aristotle's
impersonal god who is without feeling.
Anyone who knows the God revealed by Jesus of Nazareth has to feel
something of God's outrage at the sight of innocent children suffering.
He feels seething anger over the sordid things human beings do to one
another. He should be enraged. Cry out for justice to be established.
"Give me 100 people who love God and hate sin," said John Wesley, who
founded the Methodist Church, "and we will turn the world upside down
for Christ!" Dr. Jack Arnold quoted that line from Wesley in the final
sermon he preached in January 2005 -- collapsing and dying in his
pulpit as he moved to its conclusion -- and said, "I think I could find
100 men and women who love Christ in America, but I am not sure I could
find 100 men and women in America that hate sin." I have been haunted
by that line since reading it. I fear he is correct.
God is passionate!
I fear we are so sophisticated and unmoved by evil that it doesn't make
us angry. We'd rather do lists and observe rituals. We prefer to fight
our church battles over whose doctrine is sounder than to follow Jesus
into unpleasant places for the sake of caring about prisoners,
prostitutes, and pushers.
Is there a parent reading this who would not be enraged at the person
who seduced his daughter or hooked her son on cocaine? Is there anyone
so cold and indifferent to the welfare of your own flesh and blood that
you would be "unmoved" that your child has thrown away innocence? Made
memories that will haunt and terrify for the rest of life? If you could
receive such news with the calm of a statue, it is only because you
have a heart of stone! God has a tender heart that is passionate for
his sons and daughters.
If anyone has caused you to think that anger or getting mad is a
wrong-headed thing for Christians, rethink that notion. And get mad
about something that angers God.
---------
(c) 2008 Used by permission. From Rubel Shelly <rshelly@rc.edu>'s
"FAX of Life" printed each Tuesday. See Faith Matters for
previous issues of the "FAX of Life."
RELATED LINKS:
* Drugs, Children, and the Influence of Evil
http://www.heartlight.org/articles/200603/20060329_drugs.html
* Extinguishing Evil
http://www.heartlight.org/cgi-shl/praying_paul/pwp.pl?356
* Resident Evil
http://www.heartlight.org/two_minute/2m_980610_resident.html
* RubelShelly.com
This article can be found on the web at:
http://www.heartlight.org/articles/200807/20080711_godgetsmad.html
=========================== FEATURED PRODUCT =========================
THE SECRET MESSAGE OF JESUS: UNCOVERING THE TRUTH THAT COULD CHANGE EVERYTHING, by Brian McLaren
Unafraid of controversy or the uncomfortable gray areas of life,
McLaren's quest is to find the essential message of Jesus' life - even
if it overturns our conventional ideas, priorities, and practices.
http://shopping.heartlight.org/cgi-shl/link?253
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