Thought for Today
Deuteronomy 6:5 You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might.
Psalm 36:7 How precious is your steadfast love, O God! All people may take refuge in the shadow of your wings.
Romans 8:38 For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, 39 nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
1 John 4:8 Whoever does not love does not know God, for God is love. 9 God's love was revealed among us in this way: God sent his only Son into the world so that we might live through him.
Last night our Bible Study discussed grace. We had a very lively and interesting discussion. One comment really sparked my attention. One person commented that God’s grace is an expression of God’s love. That comment led to a discussion of God’s love. Ultimately, we pretty much concluded that Creation itself and everything in Creation reflects God’s love.
This morning, I did a search on my Bible software and found that the words God and love appear together in 171-249 verses in the Bible, depending on the translation. The search results do not include verses such as John 3:16-17 where other tenses of the verb love appear. I’m not sure whether I am surprised by how many of the Bible’s 31,000+ verses include both God and love, or whether I am surprised by how few do.
One of the earliest canon texts of the Bible was compiled by Marcion in the 2nd century. His canon included Luke’s gospel plus 10 Pauline epistles. “Marcion preached that the benevolent God of the Gospel who sent Jesus into the world as the savior was the true Supreme Being, different and opposed to the malevolent deity, the Demiurge or creator deity, identified with Yahweh in the Hebrew Bible.” (en.wikipedia.org) Marcion therefore discarded the entire Old Testament. “Marcionism was denounced by its opponents as heresy and written against by the Church Fathers – notably by Tertullian in his five-book treatise Adversus Marcionem (Against Marcion) in about 208.” (ibid)
We still hear the suggestion from some today that the God of the Old Testament is somehow different from the God of the New Testament. The argument that the Old Testament presents a wrathful God and the New Testament presents a loving God. This, of course ignores verses like those above and denies the immutability of God, “God’s freedom from all change, understood to emphasize God’s changeless perfection and divine constancy.” (Westminster Dictionary of Theological Terms, pg. 115-116)
As a Christian, I do believe that God’s salvific grace is representative of God’s love. I believe that the Creation Story in Genesis, especially the repeated emphasis of “And God saw that it was good” reveals that to us.
I believe that the apostle Paul correctly stated, “Ephesians 2:8 For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God—” Of course, that raised the question last night of whether God’s gift of grace is offered to all of God’s children. I believe that God’s gift of grace is freely offered to all of God’s children, irrespective of any qualifiers. This coming Sunday, in my Words of Institution, I will remind our congregation that our Communion table is truly not ours; it is the table of our Lord Jesus Christ. We believe that all are welcome at that table, irrespective of the state of our lives or even the state of our faiths.
It is God’s grace which accomplishes our salvation. That grace is freely offered to all. As Paul reminds us, it is not our own doing. There are, however, consequences. We sometimes encounter suggestions of works righteousness as a counter of alternative to faith and grace. I believe we create a false dichotomy between faith and works. I suggest everyone read, “James 2:17 So faith by itself, if it has no works, is dead. 18 But someone will say, ‘You have faith and I have works.’ Show me your faith apart from your works, and I by my works will show you my faith.”
Accept God’s grace, let your faith transform your life, trust God,
Pastor Ray