Good Morning, Meetpastordan Readers… I can’t tell you the number of times I have been confronted with today’s topic, or something similar, such as “How can a loving God put disease or tragedy on someone?” The short and true answer is, “He doesn’t”, but that never seems to satisfy the probing nature of this intended indictment. So the follow-up statement is usually of this nature: “Well, if he’s really loving and all powerful, there wouldn’t be a hell and there wouldn’t be disease and suffering!” My next answer is, “How right you are! That’s why he created the perfect world where there was no sin, no disease, and no pain and suffering. The world he created was perfect; it was paradise.”
The very nature of such questions displays an ignorance of God and his nature, as well as an ignorance of the Truth. I’m not using the term “ignorance” here to mean stupid, but rather to mean “a lack of understanding of the truth.” Most people making such statements are generally intelligent, but unfortunately they are still in the domain of darkness. But the Good News is…there’s still hope for them because God IS Love, and he doesn’t want to lose any of his proudest creation. So let’s return to Christianity 101for an overview of the basics.
“How we praise God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly realms because we belong to Christ. Long ago, even before he created the world (and Man), God loved us and chose us in Christ to be holy and without fault in his eyes. His unchanging plan has always been to adopt us into his own family by bringing us to himself through Jesus Christ, and this gave him great pleasure. So we praise God for the wonderful kindness he has poured out on us because we belong to Jesus Christ. He is so rich in kindness that he purchased our freedom through the blood of Jesus Christ, and our sins are forgiven. He has showered his kindness on us, along with all wisdom and understanding. God’s secret plan has now been revealed to us; it is a plan centered on Christ, designed long ago according to his good pleasure. And this is his plan: At the right time he will bring everything together under the authority of Christ – everything in heaven and earth. Furthermore, because of Christ, we have received an inheritance from God…” (Ephesians 1:3-11)
If you read and study only that paragraph, you cannot miss these two truths: 1.The very essence of God Is Love.(1John 4:8). That Love manifested itself by creating a perfect world for man, and man was created for a perfect relationship with a loving God, and this gave him great pleasure. But because God is omniscient as well as loving, he knew his proudest creation was going to go astray, and that is exactly what happened in the Garden. When the first inhabitants yielded to temptation, the spiritual connection that originally existed between God and Man was severed. At that moment Sin entered the world, and Man was now on his own to deal with that dilemma through his own effort. Roman 5:6 reports our progress: “When we were utterly helpless, Christ came at just the right time to die for us sinners.” Now that’s an indictment!
- Our loving God knew we could not overcome sin through our own effort, so he already had a plan in place for our salvation – even before he created us! In the paragraph above, it is hard to miss his intention. In Bible-speak, when something is repeated once, that means it is important. Two times means you can’t afford to miss this point. But in the paragraph above, his plan – Jesus Christ – is repeated eight times. Wow! That means if you miss this, you miss the ticket to heaven. God’s plan was always to save us from ourselves, and Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross paid the penalty for our sins.
So now let’s tie this in with the title. Christ’s sacrifice on the cross opened the pathway to heaven and eternal life for everyone. He died for the sins of mankind, regardless of who we are or what we have done. All we have to do to inherit this gift is believe that he is the Son of God and that he came to pay our sin-ransom. Romans 3:22-25 states this beautifully and succinctly: “We are made right in God’s sight when we trust in Jesus Christ to take away our sins. And we all can be saved in this same way, no matter who we are or what we have done. For all have sinned; all fall short of God’s glorious standard. Yet now God in his gracious kindness declares us not guilty. He has done this through Christ Jesus, who has freed us by taking away our sins. For God sent Jesus to take the punishment for our sins and to satisfy God’s anger against us. We are made right with God when we believe that Jesus shed his blood, sacrificing his life for us.
Someone much smarter than me once said: “Life is a journey. At the end we are the sum total of the choices we’ve made.” And one choice we definitely want to make is to accept Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior. “Jesus himself said, “I am the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the father except through me.” (John 14:6) God paid a hefty ransom for our souls; it cost him the blood of his Son. And why did he do this? So we can enjoy an eternal relationship with Him, Jesus and all other Christ-followers. He said, “You have to be Holy (Sin free, set aside for a sacred purpose) because I am Holy.” (1Peter 1:16) If we are stained with sin, we can’t enter his Kingdom. Why? Because sin spreads, contaminates, destroys and kills. If you doubt that, look at the world around you. Remember…this world was perfect when it was created. That’s why anyone stained with sin will not be allowed to enter. And the only way to be sin-free is to be covered with the blood of Jesus.
So you see, our loving God offered us a Gift of Grace (something we didn’t earn, nor do we deserve it). All we have to do to receive it is accept it. The choice is ours. Romans 6:23 presents this option most clearly: “For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift from God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.”
The answer to the title question is…God does not condemn anyone to hell. We condemn ourselves by refusing his Gift of Grace. And for the follow-up question in the first paragraph, the world God created was perfect. There was no disease, no pain and suffering, no death, no anger, no hatred, lying, cheating, stealing, fear, doubt, shame, addictions, pornography, gambling etc. None of this was part of God’s plan. Everything just listed is from the Prince and Power of this world…Satan himself. Because this world is ravaged with sin, we are subject to its contamination. Consequently, we experience all the ugly manifestations of that contamination. When we are faced with trials and tribulations, we have two choices: we can shake our fist at God and shout “why me”, “why me”, or we can press into Him as our source of strength and courage. Again, the choice is ours.
I want to close with this hopeful truth: “For God so loved the world, he gave his only begotten (from the same substance) Son. Whoever believes in him will not perish, but will have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.” (John 3:16-17)
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May God Bless Ya…
Dan Presgrave (a.k.a. Pastor Dan)
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