Revelation 13:7
(The beast) was given power to wage war against God’s holy people and to conquer them. …
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The fact that you are reading this indicates we survived the Mayan “end of the world” December 21. That’s nice but it doesn’t mean an apocalyptic end is not coming. This passage warns us one is coming. But doesn’t this passage seem strange to you?
Biblically we know any power originates in God so whatever power the beast has ultimately comes from God. The beast is given power, from God, to conquer God’s people. Lord, I see a few reasons You would do this but it still confuses me that these folks, who have your Word and all its wonderful promises of overcoming Satan, are going to be conquered. That seems strange to me.
Then I think of Mary. Gabriel appears telling her she will become pregnant by the Holy Spirit – a story folks are not likely to believe. (Luke 1) You could have had Gabriel tell the whole town or tell her parents so at least they would believe her story. Instead, you do it privately and let her bare the ridicule that certainly accompanied such a fantastic story. I can see some reasons You would do that but it still seems strange to me.
Or how about the fact that the road to salvation is narrow and few find it. (Matthew 7:14) I know it is not your will that any perish (2 Peter 3:9) so why not make the road huge, wide, almost impossible to miss? When you say few find it, that means the majority of people on earth will not be in heaven. I don’t like that idea. It looks to me, if you count winning and losing by the numbers you get on your team, that Satan wins and You lose. That seems strange to me.
Then there are all the promises about asking whatever we want, two agreeing upon anything, healing and miracles that sometimes happen but with no seeming predictability, rhyme or reason. No one forced you to put those promises in there or word them as absolutely as You did. Why not say, “whatsoever two agree upon I might do, if I think it is best for you?” I know we add those disclaimers but You didn’t. That seems strange to me.
I know you are God and I am not. I know there are other aspects of Your nature and Your actions that used to seem strange to me but as I came to know You better I discovered they actually revealed marvelous, mysterious aspects of your glorious character.
That being the case, I choose to believe that these things about You that still seem strange to me are there because You are infinitely wiser than me. I am confident once I discover, in this life or the life to come, why You did things as You did I will find each of these “strange” actions are reasons to revel in You and Your wisdom. Until then I will declare:
Oh, how great are God’s riches and wisdom and knowledge! How impossible it is for us to understand his decisions and his ways! For who can know the Lord’s thoughts? Who knows enough to give him advice? (Romans 11:33, 34 NLT)
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Isaiah 55:8-9
“For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the Lord. “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.”
Yep. The older I get, the more I am ‘forced’ to sit back in my comfortable couch and simply say, ‘OK, God, so be it.” I’m still yours.
Thank God for a “comfortable couch” to lean back in. Some have had to lean back in their jail cell and say the same thing. We are blessed aren’t we?
Big Amen.
Awesome read! And I guess since I am a “baby christian” I still am so confused about alot of things. I often wonder what the blood of Christ really accomplished if only a select few will go to heaven. Didn’t his sacrafice on the cross cover ALL sin? And why, if God=love does anyone go to hell? Why would he purposely create someone to suffer in hell forever? These are the things that make me go huh? And I often wonder why me? Why am I one of the few He chose to reaveal himself to? After meeting him there is no denying his existence. He is so good!!!!
Wow, Lisa! For a “baby Christian” you are certainly asking some adult questions. In fact, I am fairly sure you are not aware of it but you have touched upon one of the greatest debates in the church. I believe Jesus did die for all men and all men have the option to choose salvation. Not everyone believes that and I have dear friends who disagree adamantly with me. (They have a right to be wrong. 🙂 Seriously, the questions you ask are ones many of us do not understand, in fact, because there is so much confusion, I would venture to say no one this side of eternity really understands the answers though many loudly proclaim they have it all figured out.
We all have our guesses, based on how we read Scripture, but there are some things we just can’t wrap our minds around. As the Christian reformer John Calvin put it, and I totally disagree with him on most things, “The finite (our minds) cannot fully grasp the infinite”.
So, we just need to learn to respect folks we disagree with (assuming their opinions are based on the Scriptures and not just their own fantasies about God), love them, honor their right to be wrong (just kidding) and recognize that we too are certainly wrong in some areas. Here is something that helped me. God never calls us to know as He knows (in fact, it was the tree of the KNOWledge of good and evil that got us into this mess in the first place) but He does command us to love as He loves. So, if I understand all mysteries and have not love, it amounts to a zero, an F-, on God’s test. (1 Cor 13)
So glad the way of salvation is simple enough that a child can grasp it but so sublime that even the greatest minds cannot fully comprehend it. That’s our God. That’s just how He rolls. 😉
Keep it simple. Keep it childlike. Keep it focused on Jesus and you will do well.
Micah 6:8 …the Lord has told you what is good, and this is what he requires of you: to do what is right, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God.
Blessings and
Thanks for the comment
ESV Genesis 3:5 For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.
For me, this verse is very strange. I have always gone back to the pride of Lucifer who was made perfect. His pride brought sin into the world. But recently, I noticed Gen 3:5 where man will be like God knowing good and evil. God is love. God cannot be tempted with evil, and he himself tempts no one. So, in what sense does God “know” evil? With Satan as an intermediary between God and sin I made God unrelated to sin. God was perfect and apart from sin…until now. I know that my pushing sin off on Satan creates a Dualism of Good versus Evil in the universe. But it seems that Christians need a certain amount of schizophrenia to be able to deal with the paradoxes of God. The older I get the more I find such “illnesses” in my thinking about God.