Purpose of Creation

Then God said, "Let the earth sprout vegetation: plants yielding seed, and fruit trees on the earth bearing fruit after their kind with seed in them"; and it was so. The earth brought forth vegetation, plants yielding seed after their kind, and trees bearing fruit with seed in them, after their kind; and God saw that it was good.  Genesis 1:11-12

When my son was very young, my parents bought him a Brio table.  It was about two feet high, four by three feet in area, and it had a four inch lip around it so the Brio train pieces wouldn’t fall off.  The center of it had a river, a road and other designs painted on it.  It was nice, but not especially pretty.  When it was clean, it looked decidedly empty. 

Almost the instant the table reached home, it was filled with Brio pieces, some connected, some strewn about, awaiting their turn to be a part of play.  And this is the state the table was for years, until at last it was replaced by a computer and it was no longer needed.   It was cleared, the pieces packed away and given to another child who would spend his young years building and rebuilding train tracks.

Recently, someone “donated” (e.g. abandoned) a Brio table at our church facility.  There were no tracks or bridges or trains, just the table, all made and set up.  It looked so lonely, so empty.  Having seen this kind of table filled for so many years it seemed strange for it to sit there, without purpose, without life.

I wonder if this is how God saw the world.  He had separated light and darkness, established the sun moon and stars, the sea and land were in their proper places.  I wonder if he looked out at this creation and said, “It’s so empty.  I mean, it’s pretty enough but without movement, without stuff to play with there’s really nothing there. “

So God filled the land and filled the sea and filled the sky so that the world wouldn’t seem so bland.  Because what is a whole world if you don’t have anything to play with?

He waters the mountains from His upper chambers; The earth is satisfied with the fruit of His works.

He causes the grass to grow for the cattle, And vegetation for the labor of man, So that he may bring forth food from the earth,

And wine which makes man's heart glad, So that he may make his face glisten with oil, And food which sustains man's heart.

The trees of the LORD drink their fill, The cedars of Lebanon which He planted,

Where the birds build their nests, And the stork, whose home is the fir trees.

The high mountains are for the wild goats; The cliffs are a refuge for the shephanim.

Psalm 104:13-18 

Now I have to make a confession that my previous portrayal of God is inadequate.  Yes, he certainly wanted to fill the earth with life, but it wasn’t spontaneous.  Certainly he wanted moving parts in his world to play with, but it was much better planned than I presented above.

To a certain degree, the battle between science and religion in terms of creation has less to do with whether God was involved in creation, and more with the timing of the planning.  Did God, in one fell swoop, create all things, great and small and that one great plan established all things for all time?  Or was creation done by the seat of God’s pants, one piece at a time, and the process of creation is still going on, even now?  Theologians and fundamentalists have argued over this, but there is not real clear answer in the Bible. 

What is clear, however, is that in the planning God established the world and life to work together.  It wasn’t just that God woke up one day and decided to create the world.  Poof!  There it is!  And the next day he woke up and said, “Hmm.  Something’s missing,” as if he were a cook figuring out a missing ingredient for a soup and determining that Life was the missing ingredient.  Life and the world were made to work together.  Whether they were made at the same time is insignificant.  But the world was made to sustain life and life was made to live in the world.

There are basic ingredients to sustaining life.  The Bible mentions food, water and shelter.  Of course, most life also needs oxygen and carbon dioxide, a certain temperature range and protection from the rays and objects in space.  God made the world specifically in order to sustain the life he desired.  This world was created with life in mind.

There are other ideas of what life might be like.  Perhaps there is a kind of intelligent life that could be gaseous.  Certainly most life found in the ocean are of a very different type than us mammals (dolphins, whales and their kin excepted).  A wider array of potential life could be found.  But life was made to be sustained in this particular world.

When God created the world, he created it to be sustainable.  When God said that creation was “good” he was, at the very least, speaking of a world and life that could sustain each other, and they would. 

It is fascinating that humanity has sometimes forsaken this basic model of sustainability, not only for the world at large, but for others in their own species.  If someone is hungry or thirsty or without shelter, a large portion of humanity says, “It’s not my problem,” as if mutual sustainability wasn’t something in our very nature.

Not only is mutual sustainability part of our nature, it is in the very DNA of the earth itself.  Life supports the world and the world supports life.  The mountains provide homes for the goats and bones from dead creatures create limestone, which builds the world.  And it is the responsibility of humanity to sustain creation, even as creation sustains humanity.  It is, if possible even more, the responsibility for humanity to sustain humanity.  Because if we do not, we do not even have ourselves.  To ignore our sister in need is to vote against our own existence.

O LORD, how many are Your works! In wisdom You have made them all; The earth is full of Your possessions.

There is the sea, great and broad, In which are swarms without number, Animals both small and great.

There the ships move along, And Leviathan, which You have formed to sport in it.

Psalm 104:24-26

The great and powerful sea is the work of God.  But the greatest of the creatures in the sea is Leviathan.

Mind you, few of humanity has ever seen Leviathan, yet we are told some of this creature in the Bible.  It is a creature that lives, not in the oceans that remain on the earth, but in the waters above, in the spirit world, where it lives with other sea dragons, powerful and wise and terrible.

In Job 41, we have a poetic but detailed description of this creature:

Around his teeth there is terror.

Better not to get too close to the mouth, then.

 ¹⁵ "His strong scales are his pride, Shut up as with a tight seal.

 ¹⁶ "One is so near to another That no air can come between them.         

Very well made.  Like a tortoise shell, or a Tupperware bowl.

  ¹⁸ "His sneezes flash forth light…

That must be some pretty bad cold.

 ¹⁹ "Out of his mouth go burning torches; Sparks of fire leap forth.

 ²⁰ "Out of his nostrils smoke goes forth As from a boiling pot and burning rushes.

 ²¹ "His breath kindles coals, And a flame goes forth from his mouth.

Wow, that’s what I call morning breath.  I’ve had some horrible gingivitis in my time, but I’ve never had it dark and flaming out of my mouth.  This is not the kind of creature I think I want to be near. 

²⁵ "When he raises himself up, the mighty fear; Because of the crashing they are bewildered.

 ²⁶ "The sword that reaches him cannot avail, Nor the spear, the dart or the javelin.

 ²⁷ "He regards iron as straw, Bronze as rotten wood.

He’s scary because no one can defeat him.  Call out St. George or Bard, because they’re the only ones who could face up to this character.

³¹ "He makes the depths boil like a pot;

You know, I’m not really interested in approaching a sea creature that makes the sea boil.  I don’t care whether it’s hot or not, a monster that makes his own rapids is someone to keep away from.

Leviathan is a scary dude.  He is used as a symbol of the greatest enemies of God and humanity.  In Canaanite myths, all creation was scared to death of this serpent, and it required Baal, the greatest of all warrior gods in Canaanite mythology to take him on, and after one epic (literally) battle, Leviathan was finally defeated.  In Revelation the description of many-headed Leviathan is used to describe Satan, the enemy of Jesus and all humanity.

For YHWH God, creator of heaven and earth, his perspective on Leviathan is quite different.  It says that the archnemesis of Baal, the fear of humanity was created by God for “his sport.”  Leviathan was made to splash around the water, for God’s entertainment.

Wow.

Yes, this monster, this terror, who breathes flame and destroys all that comes near him was God’s plaything, his bathtub toy. 

Not only that, but this was his purpose of creation.  He wasn’t created to protect the sea, or to destroy or to cause havoc or to destroy.  He was created to play with, to have fun.  God perhaps has an odd idea of fun, and I’m glad he doesn’t make toys for children, but that was Leviathan’s purpose.

It seems that Leviathan might have strayed from his purpose of creation.  He was made to be good, to be a part of the creation that sustains and enjoys and is enjoyed, but now he is the byword for terror, and no one would want to come near him. 

But isn’t that like all of us.  God has created each one of us for a certain purpose, for a cause, a reason… but how many of us have fulfilled the purpose of our creation.  Perhaps few of us have made such a drastic departure as Leviathan, but some of us have come close.  Some of us have drifted such a distance from who we were supposed to be that we don’t even recognize ourselves. 

But with God, there is always another opportunity.  God made us for a certain purpose, and He has not forgotten that purpose, nor can we drift away to such a degree from that purpose that we can never fulfill it.  God, and God alone, can lead us back to our original path.  If we would but allow Him to do so.

“I want to be all that You dreamed of
When You saw my frame.”  -Isa

The Pattern of Creation

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.

Before this, there was nothing.  Then, poof!  (or Bang!) there were heavens and earth.  The two basics of all life. Sky and ground.  Ceiling and floor.  Up and down.  These are the two basics of many cosmos origin stories.  Some say that life was created from the union of these two basic elements.  Of all the ancient cosmos origins, only the Hebrew one declares that all that we know was created by an outside entity: God, who is both outside and greater than earth or heaven, and they are both submitted to him for He is the maker of both.

And we know in the Bible that when God creates, his creation is Good.  Yahweh, Elohim, the Creator, is neither evil nor is he the originator of evil.  Nor is He the originator of chaos, of empty utility.  When God finishes his creation, whatever it may be, he looks at it and says, “It is good.”

This does not mean that creation is perfect.  There is still growth to be made, things to be named, enemies to subdue, difficulties to overcome and tests to either pass or fail.  God’s creation is never a perfect creation.  It is sufficient to grow in, it is sufficient for peace, it is sufficient for sustenance.  But it can also fail, it can falter, it can become inadequate, it can potentially be destroyed.   However, when everything begins, it is enough to be called “good”. 

Thus, when the heavens and the earth were created, God looked at it and said, “it is good.”  But at the beginning of God’s six-day creation, all was not good.

The earth was formless and void, darkness was over the face of the deep, and the breath of God was over the waters.

The earth was not as God had made it in the beginning.  It was empty, vanity, chaotic, purposeless: a wasteland.  It had changes drastically away from the good that God had created.  He created a good heavens and a good earth, but there is the earth being the very antithesis of the peace that God had intended in creation. 

We will discuss how it got this way in another episode, but for now, let us look deeper at this inversion of creation, this chaos out of order, this void out of substance,  this evil out of good.   First, there is darkness.  Darkness is not of God, but of the enemy of God, in fact, darkness can be seen as the opposite of God.  God is light, in him there is no darkness at all.  But on the earth, God’s creation, is no light whatsoever.  It is completely dark.

Second, the earth is full of the deep.   The deep is the Sea, the Ocean, full of darkness, chaos and insanity.  The deep is the enemy of earthly creation, a horror story in and of itself, in opposition to God’s creation.  Even though the Sea itself is a creation of God, yet the deep pits itself against all other forms of God’s creation, leaving only destruction in its wake.  No one can determine the motivations of the sea, no one can understand it.  None except God travels into the deep, and only God dares to move His wind, his breath, his power over the top of it.

In the first verse God created all the cosmos in good and strength.  By the second verse, all is darkness and chaos and waste and horror and monstrosity. 

And God said, “Let there be light.” And there was light and God saw that it was good.  And God separated the light from the darkness.  God called the light day and the darkness night.

So God creates again.  He creates something like Himself, something good, some light to be put in the darkness, some hope to be put into despair, some order put into the chaos, some mercy in the midst of hatred.  God creates because it is in His nature to create.  In the beginning God created out of nothing, out of emptiness.  After that first creation, God’s creation only builds, re-forms, but never out of nothing again.  God will never again wipe the slate completely clean.  Something must be built out of something, even if that something is ruined, turned into evil.

Because evil is never purely evil.  There is no such thing as pure evil.  God created all things and he created them good.  So evil is simply an attempt to be better than good, which is the same impulse God has.  God also wants to see good improved.  It is just that evil uses the means of destruction.  Evil believes that weakness should be wiped away and then only the perfect will be left.

God believes that everything has its place, and that creation must be filled with weakness in order to firmly establish strength.  So when God re-created, when He took back the earth from darkness and the deep, the enemies of God, he didn’t wipe darkness out.  Instead, he gave darkness its proper place.  To wipe out one’s enemies, that is the path of evil.  God isn’t like that.  Rather, he sets boundaries, and says, “Darkness, this is your place.  But you can’t cross the border to this place.  Stay there.”

God says to the Sea, “I am giving you a place on earth, but you may not have it all.  You have a border, a limit.  You stay in this place, you may not cross over.”  Mind you, darkness and the Sea are forces of chaos.  They will test these borders, they will attempt to cross over and wield destruction.  But God always puts them back and says to them like a rebellious child, “No.  This is your place.  You may not cross over.  Stay there.”  And, like a rebellious child, they stay in their place until the next time they escape.

Our lives are God’s creation.  We were started by God in the midst of this world.  And quickly after our lives became chaotic, ugly, even horrific.  We think we can fix it, but we find that fixing our lives is like placing darkness in a box, pushing the sea back with a bulldozer.  It can’t be done.  We don’t have the capacity for it.

Our only hope is to  have God fix the darkness and chaos of our lives.  To have Him re-create our world.  But when He does that, he doesn’t get rid of the chaos or the destruction.  Rather, he forms our lives so that the chaos remains in its place, it has a limit, it becomes manageable.  Yes, sometimes the destruction escapes and gets out of our control.  That’s when we need to call God, the Father, and ask him to put the rebellious child back in its place.  The evil in our lives is still there.  It is just limited.  With God at our side, perhaps that is enough.

Ministry to the Outcast

All true ministry has the goal of leading a people to faith in Jesus as Lord and living that out in their lives.

n  Identification—I Cor. 9:19-23  Some within a congregation that will take on the role of an outcast in order to reach them.  Get rid of the separation between the “server” and the “served”.

n  Offer to be Family—Mark 2:15-17; Luke 15.  Total love of the “sinner”, and an offer to partake in acceptance.  This is the major felt need of the outcast—social acceptability.  To offer acceptance is not to have the outcast feel that acceptance—this only comes with an acceptance of forgiveness and inclusion in the community.  This sense of family cannot be created by a program, but one can use a program as a base-point to increase this acceptance.

n  Listening—James 1:19  You cannot meet anyone’s needs until you know what they are.  Get past the first hurdles in order to discover their real needs (e.g. no one needs money, money is a means to meet the real need)

n  Benevolence—Trying to meet their needs, but doing so with dependence on God.  Those with resources, give what you have (Luke 12:33); those without, pray for healing (Matt 10).  To give what we have, may be to offer what God alone has to give, instead of the petty resources we have (Acts 3:1-8).

n  Deliverance—From Satan, from sin, from death.  This is God’s area, and if we are called to work with the outcast, we are God’s representatives. 

A.     By prayer.  (Mark 9:28-29; Luke 18:1-8). Through prayer, deliverance from oppression can occur.

B.     By teaching. (Matthew 28:19-20).  Through the teaching of Jesus’ commands, teaching and life there will come understanding of God’s justice and of gaining that justice.

C.     By dwelling with (John 1:14; Acts 2:42-47).  By living with the outcast and showing them the life of Christ they will gain understanding and the ability to live it out.

D.     By suffering for. (John 12:24-27; Colossians 1:24)  Through suffering the suffering of Christ the people of God will be redeemed.  This is the wake up call, the realization of the atonement in the lives of the people, the life of Christ in the flesh.

n  Forgiveness— Luke 15; Mark 2:1-12; John 20:23. This is also a sense of acceptance, like mentioned above, under “family”.  But this is different, in that it occurs after regret for sin and repentance is done.  This is an acceptance that comes after a wiping away of the debt of sin, and is fuller than a simple offering of acceptance.

n  Guiding to Commitment—Luke 14:26-27.

A.     Commitment to God as the one true Lord (Matthew 6:24);

B.     Commitment to living according to the righteousness of Jesus (Matthew 7:24-27; John 14:15);

C.     Commitment to Love (Mark 21:29-31);

D.     Commitment to the family of God (Matthew 12:47-50);

E.      Commitment to reaching out to the outcast (Matthew 28:19-20).

Attitudes to Minister to the Outcast

Gentleness (Proverbs 15:1; Matthew 11:28-30; Galatians 6:1-2) 

The outcast are typically wrathful, having been oppressed by the evil.  Even if they are in sin, they don’t need to be treated with harshness.  They know their sin, and if they do not, they need to be informed carefully, not with anger.  They are looking for deliverance, they are looking for family.  They will not choose to pursue family with those who are harsh or critical.  This is not to say that sin should not be spoken of—it is.  But it needs to be dealt with kid gloves, not with wrath.

Patience (Psalm 103:8; I Thess. 2:9; II Peter 3:9)

            Convictions built up over years do not melt away overnight.  It requires much patience and work to show others that God is for them, although the world be against them.  The outcast will reject you, will speak evil of you, will mock you and secretly despise you.  But over time, the message of the gospel will work in the hearts—even of those who seems least likely to hear it!  Labor patiently—literally for years—in order to see the fruit of faith.

           

Impartiality

We are not to show favoritism between social groups. (James 2:1-8; I Cor. 7:22) We are not to show favoritism between ethnic or cultural groups. (Matthew 8:11-12; Acts 10:34-35) We are not to show favoritism between knowledge of God. (Romans 2:11-13). We are not to show favoritism between sins. (James 2:10) This last is a tricky one.  We want to separate some sinners from another because one sin is worse than another.  James says that we are condemned by all of them.  If we are to offer a benefit or service to one sinner outside of Christ, then why shouldn’t we give it to all of them?  Impartiality is essential in ministry to the outcast, for their sense of injustice is strong.

Reliance on God  (Matthew 10:9-10)

            We, the ministers of the gospel, must be dependent on God.  In the New Testament, most ministry is done with total dependence on God, for no one can do miraculous healings or exorcisms of their own power.  Even so, we must not depend on our own resources or abilities to minister, but to rely on God and his work.

Surrender (Colossians 1:24; Philippians 2:3)

            In ministering to the outcast, we must be ready to sacrifice.  The needs are great—greater than we can meet.  And more will be demanded of us than we can give.  Yes, we do what we can so we can minister, but let us not set arbitrary boundaries around our love.  Instead, we should set boundaries so we can love the most people we can.  This will mean that care for ourselves might be compromised—but this is what ministry is about.  Do what you must to continue to love, and beyond that, give and give.  

Salvation is...

What is Salvation?

The salvation of the Father is…

…living with God

…a homeland of peace and security and justice

…sufficient food and drink and warmth for everyone

…deliverance from enemies and all who hate us

…a family and a community that cares for you and supports you

…the ability to worship and serve God in how he desires us to

…living obediently to God, free from sin and rebellion

…life and peace that lasts forever

The salvation of Jesus is…

…freedom from slavery to sin

…freedom from the consequences of sin, including suffering, hatred and death.

…being made right with God

…remaining satisfied with who you are without anxiety, shame or fear.

…being reconciled to your community

…being raised from the dead

…being a peacemaker, drawing others closer to God and to others

The salvation of the Holy Spirit is…

…always having the ability to do what is right

…living in love of others

…having wisdom to know and do what God wants

…understanding what is true and right

…courage to stand for God in all circumstances, no matter the cost

Your Salvation is Too Small:
If your salvation includes forgiveness, but not healing, then your salvation is too small.
If your salvation includes heaven, but not a restored earth, then your salvation is too small.
If your salvation includes Christians, but not sinners, then your salvation is too small.
If your salvation includes freedom of worship, but not food, shelter and hope for the poor, then your salvation is too small.
If your salvation includes resurrection, but not the eradication of oppression, then your salvation is too small.

If your salvation includes reconciliation between God and man, but not reconciliation between enemies on earth, then your salvation is too small.
If your salvation includes a peaceful worshiping community, but not the destitute, then your salvation is too small. 
If your salvation includes purity, but not love, then your salvation is too small.

What is Forgiveness?

The word in Greek for “to forgive” is “aphiemi”, which means literally, “to leave behind, to dismiss”, meaning that the one forgiving is dismissing the sin, debt or lack that is causing a breach in their relationship.  However, there are many words and ideas that accompany the idea of forgiveness.  To understand these many ideas, we will explore different stories that explain forgiveness.

Eating with as a sign of acceptance:

It was a common practice to eat with those whom one found acceptable and to not eat with those who were deemed unacceptable.  Jesus ate with sinners and tax collectors to let them know that their repentance mean forgiveness in the kingdom of God (Mark 2:15-17).  Jesus declared that some Gentiles would eat at the feast of God’s kingdom as a sign of acceptance by God, but the sons of the kingdom would be exiled (Matthew 8:11-12).  The early church was shocked that Peter would eat with Gentiles, which good Jews would never do (Acts 11:1-3).  Peter later refused to eat with Christians who were uncircumcised Gentiles in order to not cause offense to the Jews—however, he did offend the Gentiles (Galatians 2:11-16).  Also, a Christian who is involved in unrepentant sin should not be eaten with in order to indicate their acceptance in God’s people is restricted (I Corinthians 5:11).

This is why, in Anawim, it is not just okay to “serve” a meal to the poor.  Instead, we need to partake the meal with them, for it is offering the opportunity of forgiveness before God to those who have just experienced rejection.  There is a difference between standing over someone serving them and sitting with someone and eating with them!  One is still a higher-lower relationship; the other is fellowship.

Return from exile: (II Samuel 13:30-39, 14:21-33)

Absalom killed the eldest son of the king, and so he was in exile.  In response to pleas, the king agreed to have Absalom return to the kingdom, but not as a son of the king.  Over time, Absalom requested a full pardon and David granted it.  This is true forgiveness—an opportunity to eat with the king face to face.  To eat the king’s food eventually had a symbolic meaning—total acceptance by the king as a confidant, even if you didn’t necessarily see the king face to face (Daniel 1:3-7). 

Offering unworthy sonship: (Luke 15:11-32)

The son who left his father committed a grave offense against him—spuriously spending all the money provided for his inheritance.  When the son returned, he confessed his sin and repented of it, recognizing that he was not worthy to even enter his father’s presence.  However, the father offered full forgiveness—he allowed his son to be a full member of the household as a son, not a slave.  Then, as a display of his forgiveness, he offered a feast to celebrate the return of his son.  To describe forgiveness, the following terms are used: found, brought to life again.

Release from prison: (Genesis 43:23-34)

Joseph put his brother Simeon into prison because of his leadership in selling Joseph into slavery.  After Joseph saw Benjamin, safe and sound, he released Simeon from prison and gave all the brothers a feast in his presence.  However, the Egyptians did not eat with the Hebrews, for the Egyptians found them offensive.  Thus, while Joseph forgave his brothers fully, the Egyptians did not.

Wiping out a debt: (Matthew 18:23-35)

Forgiveness is compared to a man having a large debt, but the debt is forgiven, or wiped out. However, if the debt is not forgiven, then the man is separated or thrown into prison until the debt can be paid by relatives or friends.

Purchasing from slavery: (Psalm 107:10-16)
To show total acceptance of one who is a slave or in bondage, a lord or master can purchase the slave from his current master.  The transfer of  ownership indicates the exile from one realm of authority and the acceptance into another realm of authority.  If a slave was originally under one master, and then sold to another, it shows his exile, or rejection.  When he is purchased (or redeemed) with a price (or ransom) back to the first master, then he is “forgiven.”

Release from sickness (Job 33:15-29)

Elihu gives an example of how people are rejected by God by drawing close to death through sickness.  But after a “ransom” (purchase price) is paid, then the person is released from death and sickness and thus does the Lord show his acceptance, or forgiveness, of that one.

Conclusion:

Forgiveness is not just “having a good feeling” about someone.  Rather, it is total acceptance of that person and continuing to share one’s life and experiences with him or her.  Partial forgiveness can be offered by ceasing to punish someone for their sin.  However, when Scripture speaks of the forgiveness of God (and between brothers) it means total acceptance, a complete restoration of relationship.  This is what the cross offers us, and this is what we are to offer those who have repented of their sin. (Luke 17:3-4)

Why Christians are Wrong about Judgement

Christians love talking about judgment day.  It seems to justify everything they do.  If you stay on one side of the line, then you’re okay, but if you stray on the other side, then you are tortured for all eternity.  What is this line?  Some Christians talk about belonging to one group or another, but in the end the word they all use is “faith”.  If you believe the right thing—like God and Jesus and the resurrection and stuff—then you get to go to a good place.  If you believe the wrong thing—anything other than God and Jesus and the resurrection—then you are tortured for all eternity. 

Christians say it’s a pretty easy deal.  There’s nothing to do, just believe the right thing.  There are a couple obvious problems with this system, though.  First, not everyone has heard about Jesus, and if they have it’s easy to think of Jesus as a good story and nothing else.  None of us believes in things that aren’t given to us as fact.  Also, belief isn’t always something we can control.  You could tell me that Thor and his hammer rule the world, and no matter how much you try to convince me, I can’t really believe it.  Even if I wanted to, I just couldn’t make myself do it.  So why would I be punished for eternity because I couldn’t believe in Thor?  And how different is the story of Jesus?

But that’s not why Christians are wrong.  They are wrong because there is one phrase throughout the Bible that describes how people will be judged on the last day: “Everyone will be judged according to what they have done.”  There isn’t a single verse in the Bible that says that God will choose the Christians to inhabit the good place and the bad place to be for the non-Christians.  Rather it is all based on how people live—whether they lived good lives or bad ones.

So what makes a good life as opposed to a bad one?  Does it mean a life of sexual purity and singing praise to God?  Does it mean attending the right church?  Actually, Jesus talks about it quite plainly.  Those who exhibit mercy and love in their lives are the ones who get the thumbs up, and those who are apathetic and uncaring get the thumbs down on judgment day.  Specifically, Jesus says that those who spend their time feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, housing the homeless, helping immigrants, healing the sick and being kind to people in prison are those who get to hang out with God.  Which only makes sense, because God is love and it’s only reasonable that he’d want to hang with kind people for eternity.  And those who don’t do kind deeds are separated from God, which also makes sense because why would God want to hang out with self-righteous, stingy people?

But what Jesus says about these guys is even more surprising.  That the people who got in, didn’t know they were getting in, and those on the outs didn’t know they were being thrown out.  When they saw Jesus dividing the people between good and bad, they thought they’d be on the other side.   Why is this?  Probably because they’ve been told all their lives that being on the right side has to do with what you believe and which religious group there is.  But in the end, there will be Buddhists and Muslims and atheists and pagans who get to hang out with God and plenty of Christians and Jews who don’t.  Why?  Because anyone who acts out the generosity and kindness and love of God are the kind of people God wants to hang out with.  And self-righteous prigs who think their intellectual capacity and the pious activities they do are enough to be with God never got it.  Judgement day is a party for those who show the love of God only. 

Judgment is based on what one does: Job 34: 11; Ecclesiasties 3:17; Ezekiel 33: 20; Matthew 16:27; Romans 2:6; I Corinthians 5:10; Revelation 20:13. 

Judgment is based on acts of kindness: Matthew 25:31-46

Why Christians are Wrong About Hell

Hell is a pretty much Christian concept.  In the Hebrew scriptures, it talks about punishment of the wicked, but it describes that punishment in strictly physical terms.  Christians point to Jesus and the book of Revelation who speak of the eternal fire and eternal punishment. 

The basic idea of hell is this: If you live before God, you are safe from judgement.  But if you screw up royally in your life, then you spend eternity being tortured for your screw ups.  This is the justice of God.

Many have pointed out some difficulties with this concept. Can this really be called justice?  Let’s take a pretty typical screw up: You sleep with your boyfriend before marriage.  Your body is filled with sexual desire, and it is a naturally human thing to want to have sex, but God says you need to wait for marriage, and so you screwed up.  Because of this error, even if you had no other error, you still screwed up, which  means that even if you never screwed up in any other way, you will still be tortured for eternity for this one mess up, no matter how natural it seemed at the time.  And Christians call this exchange of a single sin for an eternity of torture justice.

This crazy way of thinking isn’t why Christians are wrong.  It’s just a description of how they think.

The reason they are wrong is because they just don’t understand God.  The most common description of God in the Bible is this one: “Compassionate and gracious, slow to anger and full of merciful faithfulness, forgiving to thousands of generations.”  In summary, God is love.  He isn’t a judging God who punishes people because they look the wrong way.  Rather, he is a kind Father who leads people in the right way, and offering forgiveness for their sins.  Jesus said that he didn’t come to earth to punish people, but to show them how to love.

This doesn’t mean that the Bible doesn’t talk about God as judgmental.  He’s got plenty of room to judge people.  But it is interesting the kinds of people Jesus says will be condemned.  Those who judge others.  Those who live out lives separated from love. Those who take innocent people, who don’t know much better, and condemn them to such a degree that they will fall away from love.   God is love and God relates to people who show mercy, and those who condemn and don’t forgive and hate are the people who God will judge.

There is one other group that Jesus says will be especially judged.  That is hypocrites.  A hypocrite, according to Jesus, isn’t just someone who says one thing and does another.  A hypocrite is specifically a person who talks about God and God’s mercy, but lives out hate and condemnation.  It seems that Jesus, when he talks about hell, is really talking about a place for Christians.  Maybe not all Christians, but specifically the kind of Christians who talk about a God of love, but condemn people for not being like them. 

Seems like the people who talk the most about hell are people whom hell is being prepared for. 

Bible verses about God:
Exodus 34:6; Psalm 86:15; Psalm 103: 8,9; Psalm 145:9; Eze 18; Isaiah 30:18; Isaiah 54:8; Matthew 5:43-47; I John 4:7-8

Jesus talking about who will be judged: Matthew 13:31-42; Mark 9:41-42.