Exhibiting God's Character: Both Justice and Love
June 10, 2006 Posted by Amy Hall
From Francis Schaeffer's The God Who is There:
We must look to the Son of God, moment by moment, for these things; such things cannot be done in our own strength. We must allow Him to bear His fruit through us….Our calling…is to exhibit God and His character, by His grace, in this generation….It is possible in the flesh to be both orthodox and dead–or loving and compromising. What is not possible in the flesh is simultaneously to exhibit both the justice of God and the love of God–this can only be done through the work of the Holy Spirit. And yet anything less is not a picture of God, but only a caricature of the God who exists.
Related posts:
- Justice Stevens Agnostic about Existence of "Bill of Rights"
- Punishment is Necessary for Justice
- No Need to Fear a Conservative Justice
- I Love Men
- Looking for Love in All the Wrong Places–More on Prager's Article
- Connecting Emergent Ideas (1 of 2)
Posted in Amy's Posts, Emerging / Emergent Church, Main Page, Religion (General)
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June 11th, 2006 at 9:30 am
Interesting quote by Schaeffer–although I'm not sure if I entirely agree.
“What is not possible in the flesh is simultaneously to exhibit both the justice of God and the love of God–this can only be done through the work of the Holy Spirit.”
I would have to read the quote in context, but on its face, it doesn't seem quite right. The Holy Spirit doesn't help us exhibit both the justice of God and the love of God. He helps us to exhibit the right balance between the two–which is not the same thing. Sometimes love requires that we dispense with justice (this is mercy and grace). Justice is impartial, unmitigated by love. To those whom He loves, God does not demand justice, He extends grace. The Spirit helps us to do the same, upholding justice, yet knowing when to override justice with love. This is probably what Schaeffer meant (though not entirely apparent from the quoted text).
June 11th, 2006 at 5:45 pm
Chong, Schaeffer was saying that it's easy on our own to uphold doctrinal orthodoxy (God's holiness and standards) or it's easy on our own to compromise these things in order to be loving to people. However, we need the help of the Holy Spirit if we're to exhibit both holiness/standards/justice/orthodoxy and the love of God through our communities rather than picking one or the other. Different situations would obviously call for different responses, but both traits ought to be present in a community that's exhibiting God to the world.
I hope that clarifies the quote a little more.
June 18th, 2006 at 6:44 pm
I feel that you guys have written very well in this topic. Brian MacLaren has gone to far, but this might be our fault as well. We have had many things mixed in with our Christianity and one that we over look to often is Philosiphy and I feel the emerging chruch is using this as the back bone to the doctrine. We feel this is knowledge and we can go to a regular college and get a degree in Philosiphy so it must be ok. I feel it is for some and not for others reason being some folk take thing way to serious and other use things just for pure knowledge.
It seem to be that the folk that that take it to serious are the ones that start there little cults everywhere and start tearing down the faith.
Think of it like this in other religions like the Muslims, Hindu's, Buddas and whatever they are not having trouble with doctrine issues. Its very true that they are following the wrong Theology and do have extremist, but it remains that there faith never changes its the same from day one to present..
In Christianity someone always has a better way and this involves a short cut and that short cut always cuts out the true living God the Lord Jesus Christ…..
I feel that if we as Christians would do our job and get away from the world for one minute we could do corprate damage meaning fixing these things once and for all…
So how do we do that we pray together, we do the Lords supper together, we read the Bible together, We love one another (Not LUST), and we focus together…..
I for the life of me dont understand why the gospel has to be changed every 10 or so years its just fine the way Jesus left it. We need to stop having excuses and start doing Kingdom work. I pray for Brian MacLaren that he will not enter the kingdom of hell for his attacks against the Lord Jesus Christ…..
Anyway thats my idea……..
June 18th, 2006 at 7:11 pm
Thanks, Joe. Any philosophy–even one that claims to be Christian–that undercuts the Bible will be a problem. Just as in the Garden the first line of attack was to get Eve to doubt God's word, the strategy is the same today. All that our fallen nature needs is a little wiggle room (i.e., “we can't really know what God said”) to throw a few things out and replace them with something else.
But I don't just say this for practical reasons (i.e., I wouldn't say that the belief that we can't really know what God says causes problems, therefore we should believe we can), I say it because I think we have good reason to believe we can know what God has communicated to us.
For example, God Himself seems to think we have that ability as He says in Deuteronomy 30:11-14:
“For this commandment which I command you today is not too difficult for you, nor is it out of reach. It is not in heaven, that you should say, 'Who will go up to heaven for us to get it for us and make us hear it, that we may observe it?' Nor is it beyond the sea, that you should say, 'Who will cross the sea for us to get it for us and make us hear it, that we may observe it?' But the word is very near you, in your mouth and in your heart, that you may observe it.”
In other words, the words He's given us to help us know His character and what He expects from us are not beyond our ability to understand.
June 18th, 2006 at 7:45 pm
The previous comment by Amy may be the single biggest “out of context” leap I've seen in some time.
June 18th, 2006 at 8:22 pm
How so?
June 18th, 2006 at 8:57 pm
Mark, assuming you're referring to the quote, here's the context of the verse:
God had given the words of His commandment through Moses, and He tells them that they have no excuse not to follow it because it's right there before them–the words (His commands) are not beyond their reach. God had given them words they could understand. He was able to communicate effectively to them through words. That demonstrates the principle that God thinks it's possible to communicate effectively through the use of language.
I don't think it's a leap to say that this is the way God works. He has given us the Bible (not everyone believes this, but assume He has for a moment), just as He gave the words from this passage through Moses, because He had something to communicate to us–so we would have “words very near us, in our mouths and in our heart that we may observe it.” There's no reason to think He was able to communicate clearly through words then but that language would be inadequate and insurmountable later.
I'm not saying everything in the Bible is perfectly clear–especially not without work! But I am saying that when God communicates important things to man, He does it in a way (i.e., through language) that can be understood, and He assumes we can understand words (since that's His method of communication).
I just now went and checked my Deuteronomy commentary from the Tyndale series. Here are a couple excerpts:
Yahweh's commandment, i.e. the whole revelation of the divine will as set forth in Deuteronomy, was not incomprehensible, nor unattainable….God's will expressed in the convenant did not require deep searching among the mysteries of the universe, for it was as near as hearing and seeing and had been revealed plainly to Israel.
I don't think it's a huge leap to apply this to all revelation from God, saying that it's possible to understand His communication through language.
June 18th, 2006 at 8:58 pm
Also, you're welcome to talk to me directly!