Other Sheep

Scripture tells us that God is a jealous God.   This is not one of the traits of God about which people write songs or create children’s Sunday School lessons.  Nevertheless, jealousy – in its pure form, not in a perverted human way – is a definite characteristic of God’s nature.

Have you ever felt lonely even though you were in a crowd or with a loved one?  That was the jealousy of God, allowing you to be satisfied with no one but Himself.

Have you achieved a goal or reached some milestone in life, but you were still empty inside?  The jealousy of God was the reason.  He wants you to find fulfillment only in a relationship with Him.

When you sense that mankind has let you down, that society is shallow, or that life is nothing but vapor, don’t fight against those feelings.  Instead embrace them as God’s own way of drawing you more deeply to Himself.  At those times you’re simply experiencing part of God’s personality… the jealousy of God.

Today I attended a funeral.  The person who died was both a family member and a friend.  This experience brought to the surface some thoughts I’ve been kicking around for quite some time.

People try many ways to soften death.  Instead of saying “He’s dead,” they use phrases like “He passed,” or “She is no longer with us.”  There’s “He went to be with the Lord,” and I even heard death referred to as a “graduation” one time.  And of course they speak of the dead person as “the deceased,” “the departed,” etc.

But death is not soft.  It’s terrible.

Another popular position is that death is a natural part of life.  That it’s beautiful.  That death is just a step in the human experience… an almost poetic part of a process.

But death is not natural, or beautiful, or poetic.  It’s horrible.

In reality, death is quite UN-natural.  Humans were created not to die.  They had the tree of life in their midst and were meant to live forever.  But when sin entered, death showed it’s incredibly ugly head.

Death is our enemy.  Quite literally, our mortal enemy.  It is not to be softened or made less in any way than the unspeakable curse that it is.

Yes, death is a curse, but the resurrection… now that’s cool.  The resurrection proves that victory over death is possible, and that death is not as final as it seems.  Although God and His people may lose a battle, they have already won the war.

As humans who understandably hate death, it is equally understandable that we would try to soften it.  But to soften death is to dilute the resurrection.

A lot of teaching tells me that if I just pray more, read more, go to more meetings, etc. God will do bigger and better things in and through my life.  I’ve even been told that a lack of prayer has sometimes been the cause of people’s diseases going unhealed, or of someone being denied various blessings.

These beliefs cause me to question… Is God that powerless?  Is He really dependent upon me in order to heal the sick or give good gifts to His children?  And if so, doesn’t that make me - in effect - more powerful than God?

Who’s God, anyway?

My reflections on this topic touch on the fringes of a conclusion.  I think God is God and these situations resolve as He sees fit, regardless of my coercion.  Yes, it is good to pray, read, or whatever in order to align with His mind and His ways.  That’s a privilege He grants us… but it doesn’t give us His powers or make us God.

There are handwritten question marks in the margins of my bible.  I put them there myself.

Now and then I run across something in scripture that doesn’t make sense to me.  I write a question mark beside it.  Years from now, if I read the same page again, I might stumble across these.  Maybe an experience or insight in the meantime will have helped me understand, so I’ll erase the question mark.  But some of them will probably still be there when my bible and I are both dust.

At one time I would have been uncomfortable questioning scripture.  I now realize, however, that there are plenty of question marks within the text of the bible itself. 

Men and women in scripture asked God “Why me?”, “Why do evil people prosper while I am needy?”, “How long will You leave me in this horrible situation?”, and even “Are you really the Savior?”  Some of these questions were answered in their lifetimes.  Others simply were not.

It’s OK to have questions.