Author	Thread: The Goodness and Severity of God.........
Admin	The Goodness and Severity of God......... Posted : 1 May, 2010 06:24 PM I have been thinking about everyone's comments and trying to find something that would be helpful and spark some interest. I do not think much of what is on the top ten list at the Christian bookstores. most of it is shallow "feelgood" stuff. There was a book written in the 70's that I think will stand the test of time and be considered a classic. It is titled "Knowing God" and it was written by J. I. Packer. The 16th chapter is called "Goodness and Severity". Packer is a great author and I would recommend anything he has written. ______________________________________________________________________ GOODNESS AND SEVERITY ______________________________________________________________________ 'Behold therefore the goodness and severity of God,' writes Paul in Romans 11:22. The crucial word here is 'and'. The apostle is explaining the relation between Jew and Gentile in the plan of God. He has just reminded his Gentile readers that God rejected the great mass of their Jewish contemporaries for unbelief, while at the same time bringing many pagans like themselves to saving faith. Now he invites them to take note of the two sides of God's character which appeared in this transaction. 'Behold therefore the goodness and severity of God: on them which fell, severity; but towards thee, goodness.' The Christians at Rome are not to dwell on God's goodness alone, nor on His severity alone, but to contemplate both together. Both appear alongside each other in the economy of grace. both must be acknowledged together if God is to be truly known. Never, perhaps, since Paul wrote has there been more need to labor this point than there is today. Modern muddle-headedness and confusion as to the meaning of faith in God is almost beyond description. Men say they believe in God, but have no idea who it is that they believe in, or what difference believing in Him may make. The Christian who wants to help his floundering fellows into what a famous old tract used to call 'safety, certainty, and enjoyment' is constantly bewildered as to where to begin: the fantastic hotch-potch of fancies about God that confronts him quite takes his breath away. How on earth have people got into such a muddle? he asks. What lies at the root of their confusion? And where is the starting-point for setting them straight? To these questions there are several complementary sets of answers. One is that people have got into the way of following private religious hunches rather than learning of God from His own word; and we have to try and help them unlearn the pride, and in some cases, misconceptions about Scripture which gave rise to this attitude, and to base their convictions henceforth, not on what they feel, but on what the Bible says. A second answer is that modern man thinks of all religions as equal and equivalent, and draws his stock of ideas about God from pagan as wall as Christian sources; and we have to try and show people the uniqueness and finality of the Lord Jesus Christ, God's last word to man. A third answer is that men have ceased to recognize the reality of their own sinfulness, which imparts a degree of perversity and enmity gainst God to all that they think and do; and it is our task to try and introduce people to this fact about themselves, and so make them self-distrustful and open to correction by the word of Christ. A fourth answer, no less basic than the three already given, is that people today are in the habit of dissociating the thought of God's goodness from that of His severity; and we must seek to wean them form this habit, since nothing but misbelief is possible as long as it persists. The habit in question, first learned from some gifted German theologians of the last century, has infected modern Western Protestantism as a whole. To reject all ideas of divine wrath and judgment, and to assume that God's character, misrepresented (forsooth!) in many parts of the Bible, is really one of indulgent benevolence without any severity, is the rule rather than the exception among ordinary folk today. It is true that some recent theologians, in reaction, have tried to reaffirm the truth of God's holiness, but their efforts have seemed half-hearted and their words have fallen for the most part on deaf ears. Modern Protestants are not going to give up their 'enlightened' adherence to the doctrine of a celestial Santa-Clause merely because a Brunner or a Niebuhr suspect this is not the whole story. The certainty that there is no more to be said of God (if God there be) than that He is infinitely forbearing and Kind, is as hard to eradicate as bindweed. And when once it has put down roots, Christianity, in the true sense of the word, simply dies off. For the substance of Christianity is faith in the forgiveness fo sins through the redeeming work of Christ on the cross. But on the basis of the Santa Clause theology, sins create no problem, and atonement becomes needless; God's active favor extends no less to those who disregard His commands than to those who keep them. The idea that God's attitude to me is affected by whether or not I do what He says has no place in the thought of the man in the street, and any attempt to show the need for fear in God's presence, and trembling at His word, gets written off as impossibly old- fashioned--'Victorian', and 'Puritan' and 'sub-Christian'. Yet the Santa Clause theology carries within itself the seeds of its own collapse, for it cannot cope with the fact of evil. It is no accident that when the belief in the 'good God' of liberalism became widespread, about the turn of the century, the so-called 'problem of evil' (which was not regarded as a problem before) suddenly leaped into prominence as the number one concern of Christian apologetics. This was inevitable, for it is not possible to see the good-will of a heavenly Santa-Claus in the heartbreaking and destructive things like cruelty, or marital infidelity, or death on the road, or lung cancer. The only way to save the liberal view of God is to dissociate Him form these things, and to deny that He has any direct relation to them or control over them; in other words, to deny His omnipotence and Lordship over His world. Liberal theologians took this course fifty years ago, and the man in the street takes it today. Thus he is left with a kind God who means well, but cannot always insulate His children from trouble or grief. When trouble comes, therefore, there is nothing to do but grin and bear it. In this way, by an ironic paradox, faith in a God who is all goodness and no severity tends to confirm men in a fatalistic and pessimistic attitude to life. Here, then, is one of the religious By-Path Meadows of our day, leading (as in one way of another they all do) into the land of Doubting Castle and Giant Despair. How can those who have strayed this way get back on the true road? Only by learning to relate God's goodness to His severity, according to the Scriptures. The purpose of the present article is to sketch out the substance of biblical teaching on this point. The writer then spends about the same amount of time on the goodness of God, and then the severity. then he finishes the chapter with three lessons we can learn from all this. Tobiah has made comments about mainstream Christianity and the fact that Christians do not read their Bibles near enough. I also think that unpleasent parts are not being preached from the pulpits. The baptist's are the largest protestant group in the USA. They are a great denomination, but the preachers are taught the sovereignty of God in seminary and then almost all of them never mention it in any sermon, ever! The Santa-Clause view of God is worse than ever! "knowing God" was written in 1973 and things have gotten much worse. I would hope that Christians would want to be accurate about what they believe about God. We don't want our beliefs about God to be a delusion. By: J.I.Packer sincerely, James Post Reply
View Profile History	The Goodness and Severity of God......... Posted : 1 May, 2010 07:37 PM I have never seen Santa Claus mentioned in the bible but I have seen where it says the goodness of God brings men to repentance. Post Reply
View Profile History	The Goodness and Severity of God......... Posted : 1 May, 2010 11:39 PM Thanks for starting this topic, James. The text you quoted really has a lot of relevant thoughts that are definitely worth discussing here. What you quoted here reminds me a little bit of C.S. Lewis's "The Problem of Pain." It's really impossible to understand the sovereignty of God if you don't realize that His character is a blending of justice and mercy. It puts an incorrect spin on the entire Bible! I think that anytime we undermine the severity of our sin and the consequences of that as demanded by God's justice that we also undermine the significance and power of Christ's sacrifice on the cross. And it doesn't get much more basic that truly grasping, on a deep, soul-changing level, what Christ did for us. It's kinda like this: If you have an equation of x + y = z, but then you take x out of the equation and alter it to y = z, then z is of a completely different nature than it was before. But I don't think people realize that. And a lot of it does probably come down to people not reading their Bibles. Some of it definitely has to do w/ teaching... and not just the teaching from the pulpit, but teaching of the children as well, I think. People have this thought the Bible is too harsh for children... They don't want to scare their children... And to a certain extent, I understand that, kinda... But, I think it does more harm than good to withhold an aspect of God's character from your children. I think another piece of the puzzle here is that there is a real lack of transparency in the church. People are quick to say that their lives are going along just fine and that God has showered them with blessings. But we're not so eager to talk about our hardships and to really open up and reveal our brokenness. And so I think that many of us put off the impression that God is this "celestial Santa Claus" that showers us with blessings and prevents anything bad from ever happening to us... I think probably every one of us could be a little more real. I think it's difficult to minister to a nonbeliever when we don't talk about the depravity that does exist... How do you really explain God's glory adequately to someone without expressing both the goodness and the severity? I don't think you can. If you say to someone that it's about God taking good people and making their lives even better, then you're really saying nothing accurate about God at all. There's no glory in that! And no true redemption in that!! And it puts the focus on self rather than God. And I mustn't go on-and-on... lol So I will stop here! Looking forward to seeing what others think about this =) Post Reply
View Profile History	The Goodness and Severity of God......... Posted : 1 May, 2010 11:44 PM I am not sure where the severity topic comes from but it does sound the God of this world and not the father of the lord Jesus Christ. Post Reply
View Profile History	The Goodness and Severity of God......... Posted : 2 May, 2010 12:05 AM PhillipJohn, my Bible uses the term "sternness": "Consider therefore the kindness and sternness of God: sternness to those who fell, but kindness to you, provided that you continue in his kindness. Otherwise, you also will be cut off," (Romans 11:22). It's kinda like this: sternness = justice = God sending sinners to hell kindness = mercy = Christ's redemptive work on the cross Post Reply
View Profile History	The Goodness and Severity of God......... Posted : 2 May, 2010 03:04 AM PhilipJohn you need to stop calling everything you dont understand or dont agree with from satan,until you do no one wants to post here! Post Reply
View Profile History	The Goodness and Severity of God......... Posted : 2 May, 2010 03:21 AM I really think it would be great if we could keep this topic on track! Remember that we are discussing the goodness and severity of God here; we're not discussing what we like or don't like about each other! =) Post Reply
View Profile History	The Goodness and Severity of God......... Posted : 2 May, 2010 04:28 AM Steve thank you for calling me out here, but just to remind you, people have been posting all weekend on this Forum. Post Reply
View Profile History	The Goodness and Severity of God......... Posted : 2 May, 2010 10:12 PM :ROFL: Post Reply